Why I Wish You'd Update Your Blog, My Friend

Here's why, if you're one of my (very few) friends, that you owe it to me to update your blog.

First, I know it's dispiriting. I write, I post, I get, like, five or six pageviews.

But still, I write.

I do it because I love it when my friends write.

There's something about a friend's updated blog that always seems puts me in a good mood. North Korea is important news, but for me, the most important news of the day concerns how my friends are doing.

"You have a dog," I can say to a friend with a smile, "I've been keeping up with current events."

Yes, there are Facebook posts, but I'm greedy. I want more.

I don't just want to know about those chocolate chip cookies that you baked with your kid, I want to know that you do this because when you baked cookies with your mom you kind of felt like it was one of those special times where one of your parents had set aside this chunk of their life just for you and only you, and that now you're baking cookies with your kid because you want to keep that tradition going, and want your kid to know that they're always going to be the most special and perfect thing in creation to you, no matter what happens.

Anyway, in the news of Derek Leif's life, I can tell you that right now, at this moment, he is listening to Russ Borris's show The Alternate Side on WFUV, specifically the song "Ceremony" by New Order. It is a good song. It makes him think of how this band rose from the ashes of Joy Division after lead singer Ian Curtis took his own life, two months shy of 24.

And such songs make Derek Leif think of the good things that rise out of the most devastating tragedies. This, in turn, makes him think of the fact that each and every one of his friends probably has had, by this time, one or two certifiably tragic events in their lives, probably more.

And yet they bake cookies with their kids, or, in the case of Derek's friends, make french toast with their daughter, put powdered sugar on it, then raspberries on the side, and then, after putting a cup of coffee on the right side of the tray and a mimosa on the left, take a picture of their daughter bringing Mom breakfast in bed.

That is the news at this time. Good Night, and Good Luck.