Paul Simon's Wife Edie Brickell Picked Him Up in a 'Yellow 1972 Pickup Truck' for Their First Date

Paul Simon and Edie Brickell have been driving in style since the beginning of their relationship.

In the second part of the new documentary In restless dreams: The music of Paul Simon, the 82-year-old singer says that for his “first big date” with his now-wife Edie Brickell — to whom he has been married for more than 30 years — he went to Dallas to see her. “I got off the plane and she was in this yellow 1972 pickup,” says Simon in an interview for the documentary. “I guess that was our first big date.”

While Brickell, 58, didn’t meet Simon until she was 22, the “What I Am” singer says her now-husband first caught her eye when she was 16. “I had an older friend and I was flipping through her albums, and I came across alone at this beautiful face,” Brickell recalls in the documentary. “And I had shivers down the back of my neck, and I said, ‘Look at this guy,’ and she said, ‘You don’t know Paul Simon? You’ll love his music, too.'”

Paul Simon’s wife Edie Brickell recalls being warned not to date him in new documentary: ‘He’s arrogant’

Edie Brickell and Paul Simon in New York in May 1999.

Robin Platzer/Twin Images/Online USA, Inc./Getty

The duo officially met in 1988 when Brickell’s band, Edie Brickell & the New Bohemians, performed at Saturday night live. (He was then 47; she was 22.) Simon, who is a longtime friend of SNL creator Lorne Michaels, stood behind one of the cameras, and as soon as Brickell saw him, she says she felt the same feelings as when she was 16 years old. “I did, he shocked me,” she says of seeing him for the first time.

“I was ready because we played that song for two years. They said just follow the red dots on the camera, when you see the red light come on, look at that camera. I’m doing all this, feeling pretty confident going through it, and then I look at the red light of the center camera, and there’s Paul Simon standing next to him. And everyone else has gone into the shadows, and he stands out as a hologram. It was like being woken up from a dream into another dream.”

The Simon & Garfunkel singer responds to the story with a laugh, saying, “I didn’t want to distract her, and I didn’t think for a second that she was going to pay attention to me at all.”

Brickell continues, explaining that she was so distracted by Simon that she forgot the words to the song she was singing (the band’s hit single “What I Am”). “By the end of the song I’m repeating myself and you can see me turning around and saying, ‘Oh, sorry!’ the band.” After coming off the stage, Simon introduced himself to Brickell. “Even then Lorne would shut us up because Weekend Update was on and we were talking,” he recalls. “And I said, ‘We’ll talk at the after party.'”

Edie Brickel and Paul Simon perform during the 2015 Gershwin Awards honoring Willie Nelson in Washington, DC in November 2015.

Kris Connor/Getty

Paul Simon recalls being ‘exhausted’ by marriage to Carrie Fisher: ‘Mistakes upon mistakes’

While the duo got along, they were “‘shocked'” to learn that they were 25 years apart in age. “I don’t know who first asked ‘How old are you?’ We were both shocked by the responses,” says Simon. “It was like a moment where we thought, ‘Well, here’s a good idea.’ But then she said, ‘I’m coming back to New York in a couple of weeks to play a club, and I said, ‘Oh, I’ll come down!’ and she said, ‘Oh great,’ so I did. Then I went to visit her in Dallas.”

Brickell adds, “We hit it off! There was a sweet attraction.”

Three decades and three children later, Simon and Brickell’s marriage is just as strong. “Paul inspires you to think and feel things for yourself,” says Brickell. “He spreads his palms and says: ‘What are we going to do?’

Edie Brickell and Paul Simon in Los Angeles in October 2017. Ryan Miller/Shutterstock

Simon, who was previously married to Peggy Harper (with whom he has a son) and Star Wars actress Carrie Fisher, replies: “I’ve never met anyone like Edie. She is very interested in mystery – the great mystery about life. You can never solve the mystery, and that’s what’s great about it. You don’t want to solve it. But you try to get into it, and I follow what she thinks. I follow her instinct.”

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

In restless dreams: The music of Paul Simon is available to stream on MGM+.

Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education