My friend Jackie, by Carly Simon
It was the summer of 1983 when Carly Simon, by then famous for such hits as Nobody Does it Better, You’re So Vain and You Belong to Me, attended a dinner at the Ocean Club in California’s affluent summer playground, Martha’s Vineyard. Also there that evening was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. She was accompanying her son, John Kennedy Jr, himself a sometime Martha’s Vineyard resident and acquaintance of Carly’s, and he introduced the two women briefly. Conversation haltingly began and soon they were bumping into each other more frequently – with an invitation to Carly’s home on the island issued not long after.
This would prove the birth of an incredible friendship which would see them share long lunches, dinner dates, trips to the movies and theatre as well as insights on love, life and the most intimate of secrets. Now, more than 35 years since that first chance meeting, Carly has shared her memories of the woman she came to love and cherish in a new book, Touched by the Sun. Following is an edited extract Carly granted exclusively to The Australian Women’s Weekly.
met up at the movies in the same way. When she arrived before me, I would find her inside the movie theatre by going to the ladies’ room, where she would be waiting in one of the stalls. That afternoon, at the 4pm showing of , was no different. Her Gucci loafers were poking out from beneath a stall. I hummed a bar of a familiar, which was the signal for all clear.
