About

There is something magical about meeting a girlfriend with whom you instantly click. Like being in Kindergarten and meeting your very first pal in the sandbox (mine was Toni Taylor on the playground of Parkmead Elementary School in Walnut Creek, California).

Something elemental and simple in each of you connects, before being a grownup complicates things. You each just know you are going to be Best Friends.

If that first high is sustained over time, the New Best Friend becomes a New Best Friend Forever.  

Everyday me

We can make New Best Friends Forever at any age. I’ll bet there are new ones being made right now in nursing homes across the country, even as the time left is getting short and all the more precious.

That’s what this blog is about. On a fun level: what kinds of stuff do we share with those friends? Another name for the blog could be: Hiding in Plain Sight. Friends make us pay attention, see what is right there, share what really matters. More serious and deeper: what makes a friend new, best and forever?

I was a commentator for years for National Public Radio's Morning Edition and then for American Public Media's Marketplace. I got paid (not much), as I joked at the time, to think. About anything that struck me as interesting and important. For awhile I was introduced as a “policy analyst” until the editor figured out I really wasn’t. But, it was great while it lasted. Another editor called me “The Little Mary Sunshine of NPR.”

Dressed-up me

Then I became a biographer and, under my married name (Kate Buford), published serious, weighty books about very masculine men.

But, all along, I kept noticing that even the most successful and professional women, in any field, at any age, had one thing in common: when the work is done, they love to talk about the fun and sustaining stuff most women have in common. 

I’m always asking -- and being asked by -- friends where they/I got this necklace, that perfume, those pair of shoes, the great tarte recipe, unforgettable book, must-have gizmo, job strategy, whatever. So, I thought I’d start a conversation about it, share the love.

Now that blogging has taken the place of radio commentaries, NewBestFriendsForever is a new platform for me to explore this dynamic of friendship, have an excuse to write about my life and to hear back from you about yours. My maiden name, Katey Lee, is my blogger name to mark this parallel track -- to get back to basics, back to that California sandbox.

I’ll share with you the fun discoveries -- and maybe some serious ones – of daily life in my home base in the beautiful mountains of Virginia. And there will be monthly trips to New York for work and to see my son, Will, in Brooklyn, plus frequent jaunts out to Northern California, where I grew up and where my siblings, nieces, nephews, daughter Lucy, her husband and her two little boys (my grandsons, born 2009 and 2012) live. Lucy will do some guest posts and we'll share recipes and projects.

And you'll share back with me. I learned from writing biographies that everyone has a story. Everyone. What do you want to share? Tell me.  
Katey Lee