I recall clearly that day many years ago, when I visited the Isaacs' home along East King's House Road, St Andrew, and told the children playing on the veranda I wanted to speak with their father.
Suddenly, they stopped playing. The youngsters, who a short while ago had responded warmly to my greeting, were now trying to get each other to do my bidding. No one, it seemed, was anxious to get dad.
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I looked around to see his wiry figure struggling to get one hand through a shirtsleeve, one of his trademark fedora firmly in place atop his head. We chatted as if nothing had happened and parted on the best of terms.
Some time afterward when I encountered him at home, Gregory was in a much better mood, and I was the one feeling out of sorts - again as a result of what he said, but this time for a different reason.
"Your words them use 'gainst me," he said nonchalantly as we relaxed. Seeing my puzzled look and sensing my consternation, he went on to explain that a consular officer at the US Embassy had denied him a visa, crippling plans for a tour.
Citing an interview carried in The Sunday Gleaner of July 31, 1988, the officer declared that he could not grant the visa, given that the entertainer had admitted to using hard drugs and, specifically, crack cocaine.
As I braced for the verbal outburst, he continued to smile, moving the conversation to other topics, never once showing any sign of malice or rancour. This was the 'Cool Ruler' at his coolest and I at my most confused.
Entitled 'Gregory fighting hard to kick cocaine habit', the article in question detailed his drug addiction and the heavy toll it had taken, his desire to be free, and the uphill struggle he faced at age 38.
Written in collaboration with photojournalist Michael Conally, also a Gleaner staffer, the article documented the first - and to date, most frank -admission of drug abuse by a Jamaican superstar.
He also made it clear that the decision to come clean about his drug habit was nowhere as hard as trying to quit, sharing lyrics from one of his many autobiographical songs. "I am not a snake in the grass, not a hypocrite, yeah/ Anything I do I'm big enough to own up to it."
When his gaunt, scrawny frame began to show signs of improvement, Gregory explained that in addition to better nutrition, he now understood the importance of hydration, which he had long neglected, and was now eating and sleeping much better than he had in a very long time. Among his friends and relatives, hope was renewed that the coolest man around was indeed back in town.
"If you don't take vitamins (while using cocaine), it dehydrates your system. It takes liquid from your structure, so you have to continue putting in liquid. That makes you sweat, so you have to take vitamins," he shared.
In the 1988 interview, Gregory lamented the incalculable price he paid for the addiction he described as dangerous and costly - with freedom, love, respect, money, friends and privacy lost to and through drugs.
"It's the greatest college I've been to - the Cocaine High School - but also the most expensive school fees that I have ever paid ... . I learnt a lot from it, both good and bad. I wouldn't encourage anybody to try it."
Once the hits started paying off though, and he could afford to move with the 'in' crowd, the entertainer found himself on the other side of the fence, recalling his first foray into drug abuse as "very nice but dangerous".
A complex character, Gregory has proven time and again to be a contradiction in terms. Many have made the mistake over the years in thinking that because they have been associated with him or worked with him, they really know him. That assumption is fallacious, since the Cool Ruler allows you to know only as much about him as he wants you to.
I was privileged to be on the receiving end of some of his insight, and caught glimpses of Gregory the philosopher. He shared with me that, contrary to public perception, the song Night Nurse is not about drugs but rather pays homage to a man's woman, who in his time of need, becomes for all intents and purposes, his night nurse.
"When you feel sick, you belly a hurt or you have a headache inna the night, the first person you draw (call) for is you woman. Whether she make a cup a tea or whatever she haffi do, she a really the first nurse deal with you. If you have a bredda (brother) who is a doctor and him even have a helicopter and you take sick inna the night, by the time you fi call and him come, you dead."
Gregory Anthony Isaacs rose to become one of reggae's most loved, respected and widely travelled ambassadors, holding the distinction of performing on every continent I believe. No mean feat for the son of Enid Murray and Lester Isaacs who was born in Fletchers Land, downtown Kingston.
A text message from my sister, Charmane, which I suspect was meant to offer some comfort, achieved very little and, when my mother called in the night to offer her condolences, I almost broke down.
So, to Gregory's mother, Ms Murray, wife June, brother 'Jiro', children, grandchildren and other relatives and friends, it is my hope that in this your time of grief, "Jah will guide you out and coming in/What more can I say ... ?"
He shared with me that, contrary to public perception, the song 'Night Nurse' is not about drugs but rather pays homage to a man's woman, who in his time of need, becomes for all intents and purposes, his night nurse.
But for widow June Isaacs, it is more than that, she lost the love of her life. One year later, she says It has been a hard year, he is gone but never forgotten. He left a void that will never be filled, but he has left a legacy that will live from generation to generation.
To commemorate his passing, June Isaacs will be teaming up with music producer Tad Dawkins to launch a drug awareness campaign in memory of her late husband who himself battled drugs throughout his career. 152ee80cbc