 | Michael Wray October 23, 2022 |
GOD SAVE THE QUEEN?
I Don’t Get it I was watching Mike Myers go on about the Queen’s passing on The Tonight Show the other evening. He was expressing his sadness and thoughts about the Queen vis a vis his Canadian heritage. It reminded me of the posts I had seen online by Canadian friends back home – one even blacked out…
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| Michael Wray October 8, 2022 |
YOU CAN NEVER GO HOME AGAIN
Really? Never? I’ve spent the past couple of months processing my trip home to Canada this summer and have mixed feelings about the title of Thomas Wolfe’s posthumously published final novel. On the one hand, I love my adopted country, Turkey, and can’t imagine going back to live in my homeland. On the other, when I do…
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| Michael Wray June 23, 2022 |
THE SECRET LIVES OF THINGS 2
Previously… In my first installment of The Secret Lives of Things, https://laserwraypublishing.com/2021/12/22/the-secret-lives-of-things/, I spoke of my passion for art and the stories which each item in my collection whispers to those with ears to hear. Last November I travelled to London to pick up a ceramic bowl by a talented artist named Ian Thompson, whose works don’t just…
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| Michael Wray June 23, 2022 |
Green Turns to Brown
Watching aspirations blow away upon breezes of despair and I can’t help wondering where all the time went. Once I was young and the days stretched before me like the proverbial gold paved highway of opportunity. Yet the seconds ticked away and were carelessly spent. The days added up into years until… One day I awoke in fear,…
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| Michael Wray June 10, 2022 |
The Sweet Spot
“If you’re sad today, just remember that the world is 4.4 billion years old and you somehow managed to live at the same time as David Bowie.” Simon Pegg Long Ago and Far Away My best friend and I often discuss how lucky we both were to have been born in 1960. We are united…
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| Michael Wray May 26, 2022 |
America, Whither Goest Thou?
The Fall of Rome I’ve often wondered if the normal citizens of Rome realized that their civilization was on the verge of collapse before it finally came to pass. We’re told it was attacks by the Goths and Visigoths that precipitated Rome’s downfall but what if the mechanisms of state had their own demise hard wired into the…
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| Michael Wray April 27, 2022 |
Overwhelmed
Interesting Times Most of us have heard the Chinese curse, “May you live in interesting times.” But I wonder if there has ever been a period of history when people weren’t living in interesting times. It is worth remembering that the grandparents of most Boomers lived through a savage epidemic, two world wars and a global depression. Nevertheless,…
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| Michael Wray April 5, 2022 |
A long and Winding Road
A Most Consequential Meeting The main theme of Milan Kundera’s book, Life is Elsewhere, is the notion that the grass is always greener on the other side of the street. That is, that we might be happier someplace else instead of the place we actually are. I live in İstanbul but the circumstances around how I came to…
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| Michael Wray March 21, 2022 |
The Mainstream Media
The Problem In the past few years, news media outlets of all sorts have come under increased attack concerning their reliability. Viewers and readers of the news on both the left and the right accuse the other side of presenting “fake news” which increases our suspicion of what is actually real or not. Of course, a lot of…
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| Michael Wray March 6, 2022 |
HAVE I BECOME “THAT” UNCLE?
Another Spoiled Thanksgiving A common trope of comedians these days is the cliché of “that” uncle, a close family member who spoils family get togethers with extremist, usually right-wing views. It doesn’t have to be an uncle though but could be any family member whose outpouring of raw, unfiltered, opinionated bullshit throws a monkey wrench into an ordinary…