"Make new friends/ But keep the old/ One is Silver/ The other gold"

When I was in Paris two weeks ago, I couldn't help but thinking about the song "Make New Friend (But Keep the Old)" that I learned in Girl Scouts, because I've been to Paris with both new and old friends within the last year.

Paris was my third destination on my trip with Anna (after Marseilles and Nice). Anna is the third "old" friend with whom I have experienced Paris since I have lived in France this year.

 (picture on the right taken in Le Louvre from Godard's La Bande a Part).

Anna and I have known each other since middle school, but we became good friends on Spring Break Senior year, when we shared a room in Destin, Florida at a house on the beach. The tan faded, but the friendship didn't. The picture below is of Anna in Paris at the Jardin des Tuileries.

The next "old" crony with whom I experienced Paris is Eleanor. I have known Eleanor since elementary school; we shared friendship rings and playground balance beams. She's half-English and would use vocabulary such as "rummage," "tidy up" and "ring you."  After summers in England, she return with a British accent; this would always make my friends giggle, as it was the most foreign thing we knew at 10 years old.  Here she is looking very intellectual at the English bookstore, Shakespeare and Company in Paris.

 

Ali is the other "old" pal with whom I met in Paris: actually twice this year! Eleanor, the lady above, introduced me to her when we were merely preteens. However, we became better buddies in high school when she let me listen to her glorious Flaming Lips' CD at Winter Camp. From then on, she has been my music soulmate, going with me to concerts such as The Shins, Wilco and The Kills. Here she is eating Quiche in a Parisian cafe.

And here she is from our first meeting in Paris, waiting for the metro:

  So there you have it. "Old Friends," which brings up another song:  

"Old Friends--Bookends" by Simon and Garfunkel:

Old friends
Sat on their park bench
Like bookends
A newspaper blown through the grass
Falls on the round toes
Of the high shoes
Of the old friends

Old friends
Winter companions
The old men
Lost in their overcoats
Waiting for the sun
The sounds of the city
Sifting through trees

Settles like dust
On the shoulders
Of the old friends...

Old friends
Memory brushes the same years
Silently sharing the same fear...
Time it was, and what a time it was, it was
A time of innocence, a time of confidences
Long ago, it must be, I have a photograph
Preserve your memories; they're all that's left you