Author: Michael Murray

The cab driver had a gentle manner, big hands and an easy smile. Leaning back, he asked me about the streetcar tracks that ran down the centre of Queen Street. He was from Ghana, it was his first winter in Toronto, and he was concerned that when the weather got cold the streetcar tracks would…

On Saturday, Rachelle and I went to Yonge Street to run some errands. Huddled beneath a blanket on the sidewalk were three people. The most confident of them, a man with a big, bushy beard and a scattering of teeth, lit up when he saw Rachelle. “Hey pretty lady! Look, look, I’m the original panhandler!!”…

On Thursday afternoon, Heidi—our Miniature Dachshund—and I went to play fetch in the dog park. Everything was fine for the first 10 minutes or so, and then Rex, a bounding Poodle five times the size of Heidi, came along. The dog was well behaved, playing fetch over on his side of the park, but all…

Behind the apartment where Rachelle and I live is an abandoned public school where I take our dog for her daily sessions of “fetch.” It’s the perfect dog park because it’s fenced in, protected from the speeding industry of Queen Street and not very well known. However, Captain America and his show-off Doberman have been…

Over the last dozen years or so, Christopher Hitchens became an unlikely kind of hero to me. On Friday, a debate on whether religion was a force of good in the world, took place between Christopher Hitchens and Tony Blair at Roy Thompson Hall in Toronto. As the 2,800- seat venue was sold out, and…

As I get an awesome and overwhelming amount of fan mail, I find it very difficult to respond to each letter. However this week, I decided to respond to one, just to stay in touch with my admirers. The email came from Luis Ramirez Gallego. “Happy Thanksgiving to you and your loved ones I was…

Michael Murray has give the Blog over to Heidi, his Miniature Dachshund for the day. ******************* Bad days for Heidi, very dark days. Weather cold and two-leggers I protect in den have gone crazy. They bring new Alpha into pack. Strong two-legger who no smell of fear. He come into den twice a week and…

Rachelle and I live in a building on Queen Street East that’s over 100 years old. It used to be a hotel, but is now home to four apartments, one of which is ours. For whatever reason, the landlord has been unable to arrange any sort of mailbox system for his tenants, and so our…

From a postcard found on the streets of Little India in Toronto on November, 15, 2010 Somewhere off in the distance somebody is strumming a guitar. I can hear it through my open window. Softly, it drifts in beneath the hum of the fan, as if with breath held and shoes in hand. Looking across…