Punk rock legend Patti Smith is coming out with a raved-about memoir today, Just Kids, about her relationship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe and the downtown NYC arts scene in the 1960s and 70s. The two were friends, lovers, muses, and more–well before either one of them got famous. (The photo at left, by Gerard Malanga, was taken in 1971 on their fire escape at the Chelsea Hotel.)

There’s a wonderful profile of Patti Smith in last week’s New York magazine, with some quotes from her that dazzle my creative self and drive home the essential role we can play in birthing each others’ dreams:

“A day doesn’t go by where I don’t create something. Sometimes it’s a rough day and I’m about to go to sleep at eleven o’clock, but I’ll get my Polaroid and take pictures of a series of things. Then I go to bed really happy because I have something to look at, something I did.”

and

“Robert believed in me as much as he believed in himself, and it was
incredible how much he believed in himself,” says Smith. “He would not
rest until he helped me dive down, down, down, and access my confident
part. And I did access it, finally. It came out in a funny way, as a
performer. But because he gave it to me so early in life, I don’t have
to be given it again and again–I just have it. I might have to work to
find it when my world gets shook. But I can always find it.”

Like what you see? Click here to subscribe and get Fresh Living in your in-box every day!