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Pat Mitchell: So I was thinking
about female friendship a lot,

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and by the way, these two women
I'm very honored to say

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have been my friends
for a very long time, too.

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Jane Fonda: Yes we have.

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PM: And one of the things
that I read about female friendship

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is something that Cervantes said, he said:

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"You can tell a lot about someone,"

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in this case a woman,

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"by the company that she keeps."

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So let's start with --

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(Laughter)

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JF: We're in big trouble.

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(Laughter)

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Lily Tomlin: Hand me one of those waters,

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I'm extremely dry.

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(Laughter)

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JF: You're taking up our time.

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We have a very limited --

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LT: Just being with her
sucks the life out of me.

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(Laughter)

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JF: You ain't seen nothing yet.

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Anyway -- sorry.

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PM: So tell me, what do you
look for in a friend?

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LT: I look for someone who has
a sense of fun,

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who's audacious,

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who's forthcoming, who has politics,

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who has even a small scrap
of passion for the planet,

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someone who's decent,
has a sense of justice,

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and who thinks I'm worthwhile.

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(Laughter)

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(Applause)

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JF: You know I was thinking this morning,

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I don't even know what I would do
without my women friends.

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I have my friends, therefore I am.

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LT: (Laughter)

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JF: No, it's true.

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I exist because I have my women friends.

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They --

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You're one of them.

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I don't know about you.

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But anyway --

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(Laughter)

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You know, they make me stronger,
they make me smarter,

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they make me braver.

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They tap me on the shoulder when I might
be in need of course-correcting.

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And most of them are
a good deal younger than me, too.

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LT: Thank you.

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(Laughter)

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JF: No I do, I include you in that,

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because listen, you know --

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it's nice to have somebody still around
to play with and learn from

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when you're getting toward the end.

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LT: I'm glad, I'm glad you --

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JF: I'm approaching --
I'll be there sooner than you.

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LT: No I'm glad to have you
parallel aging alongside me.

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(Laughter)

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JF: I'm showing you the way.

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(Laughter)

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LT: No, you are and you have.

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PM: Well as we grow older,

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and as we go through different kinds
of life's journeys,

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what do you do to keep
your friendships vital and alive?

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LT: Well you have to use a lot of --

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JF: She doesn't invite me over much,
I'll tell you that.

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LT: I have to use a lot of social media --

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you be quiet now.

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(Laughter)

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And so --

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(Laughter)

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And I go through --
I look through my emails,

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I look through my emails,
I look through my texts

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to find my friends, so I can answer them
as quickly as possible,

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because I know they need my counsel.

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(Laughter)

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They need my support,

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because most of my friends are writers,
or activists or actors,

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and you're all three,

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and a long string
of other descriptive phrases,

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and I want to get to you
as soon as possible,

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I want you to know that I'm there for you.

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JF: Do you do emojis?

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LT: Oh ...

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JF: No?

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LT: It's embarrassing.

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JF: I'm really into emojis.

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LT: No I spell out my --

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I spell out my words of happiness
and congratulations,

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and sadness.

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JF: You spell it right out --

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LT: I spell out every letter.

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(Laughter)

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JF: Such a purist.

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You know,

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as I've gotten older, I've understood more
the importance of friendship.

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So, I really make an effort
to reach out and make play dates --

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not let too much time go by.

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I read a lot so,

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as Lily knows all too well,

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my books that I like,
I send to my friends.

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LT: When you knew we would be here today

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you sent me a lot of books about women,
female friendships,

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and I was so surprised to see
how many books,

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how much research
has been done recently --

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JF: And were you grateful?

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LT: I was grateful.

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(Laughter)

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LT: And --

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JF: And --

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LT: Wait, no, it's really important
because this is another example

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of how women are overlooked,
put aside, marginalized,

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there's been very little
research done on us,

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even though we volunteered lots of times.

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JF: That's for sure.

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(Laughter)

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LT: No-- this is really exciting,

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and you all will be interested in this,

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the Harvard Medical School Study has shown

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that women who have
close female friendships

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are less likely to develop impairments --

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physical impairments as they age,

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and they are likely to seem to be living
much more vital, exciting --

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JF: and longer --

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LT: and joyful lives.

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JF: We life five years longer than men.

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LT: I think I'd trade the years for joy.

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(Laughter)

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LT: And, but the most important part
is they found --

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the results were so exciting
and so conclusive --

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the researchers found

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that not having close female friends
is detrimental to your health,

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as much as smoking or being overweight.

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JF: Well -- and there's
something else, too --

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LT: I've said my part, so ...

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(Laughter)

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JF: Okay, well listen to my part,
because there's an additional thing.

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Because they only --

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for years, decades --

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they only researched men when they
were trying to understand stress,

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only very recently have they researched
what happens to women when we're stressed,

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and it turns out that
when we're stressed --women,

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our bodies get flooded by oxytocin.

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Which is a feel-good, calming, 
stress reducing hormone.

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Which also is increased
when we're with our women friends.

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And I do think that's one reason
why we live longer.

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And I feel so bad for men
because they don't have that.

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Testosterone in men diminishes
the effects of oxytocin.

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LT: Well when you and I
and Dolly made "9 to 5" --

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JF: Oh --

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LT: We laughed, we did,
we laughed so much,

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we found we had so much in common.

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And we're so different.

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Here she is like Hollywood royalty,

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I'm like a tough kid from Detroit,

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she's a southern kid
from a poor town in Tennessee,

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and we found we were so in sync as women,

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and we must have--

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we laughed until we must have added
at least a decade onto our lifespans.

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JF: I think -- we sure
crossed our legs a lot.

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(Laughter)

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JF: If you know what I mean.

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LT: I think we all know what you mean.

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PM: You're adding
decades to our lives right now.

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So among the books that Jane
sent us both to read on female friendship,

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was one by a woman we admire greatly,
Sister Joan Chittister,

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who said about female friendship

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that women friends
are not just a social act,

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they're a spiritual act.

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Do you think of your friends as spiritual?

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Do they add something
spiritual to you life?

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LT: Spiritual -- I absolutely think that.

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Because --especially people
you've known a long time --

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people you've spent time with,

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I can see the spiritual essence
inside them,

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the tenderness, the vulnerability.

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There's actually kind of a love,
an element of love in the relationship.

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I just see deeply into your soul.

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PM: Do you think that, Jane?

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LT: But I have special powers.

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JF: Well there's all kinds of friends.

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There's you know, business friends,
and party friends,

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I got a lot of those.

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But the oxytocin producing friendships,

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they have -- they feel spiritual
because it's a heart opening, right?

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You know, we go deep.

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And I find that I shed tears a lot
with my intimate friends.

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Not because I'm sad but because
I'm so touched and inspired by them.

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LT: And you know one of you's
going to go soon.

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(Laughter)

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PM: Well two of us are sitting here, Lily,
which one are you talking about?