Make new friends,
But keep the old.
One is silver,
And the other, gold.
A circle's round
It has no end
That's how long
I'm gonna be your friend.

A fire burns bright,
It warms the heart.
We’ve been friends,
From the very start.
You help me,
And I’ll help you
And together
We will see it through.
The sky is blue
The Earth is green
I can help
To keep it clean.
Across the land
Across the sea
Friends forever
We will always be.

I met my friend Cookie 37 years ago. I’d been in San Francisco a couple years and Cookie was fresh from Jamaica. She told me she was looking for an apartment and I saw my Napier Lane (just off the Filbert Steps on Telegraph Hill) was moving so I told her to rush on over. She rented that studio for $400 a month (yes, I know it’s hard to believe as we walked the ‘hood last weekend and saw similar apartments renting for $3,000 a month). I love the fact that Cookie paid her rent each month by putting $400 under a rock next to her apartment and, boy, did we have some rollicking parties in that boho enclave.

As you’ll see in this video with Cookie and me on the Lane, we love each other very much. She lives much of the time with me and Oren in our Baja home and she’s our MEA photographer (Cookie has published a number of well-respected coffee table books. I also got to spend some quality time with Wanda Whitaker over the weekend who I’ve known almost as long as Cookie.

So, yes, aging is about blending the old and the new. I see it nearly every week at MEA when a new cohort of MEA virgins arrives with a certain caution about making new friends. Within a day or so, they realize just how deeply you can make a friend as you get older because you can cut through the BS and get to the core of knowing another person. Hope you enjoy this video of me and Cookie.