Persephone Abbott

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Paradise

Posted on March 31, 2025

I had thought about it. The American Photography exhibition at the Rijksmuseum. Then my phone via Facebook or Instagram or Osmosis-Goo suggested that I seriously consider buying a ticket, like right now, click the link and chakka-gotcha! The Rijksmuseum sits just around the corner from my apartment, a five minute walk. Motivated, I took the bait. Walking through the exhibit at 9 a.m. on a Monday morning, I thought about my age. From my memory bank I can understand the subject matter in the photographs, either because I was already born or my grandparents were alive during the early to mid 20th century era or because the historical photographs of locations were still somewhat recognizable to what I recall seeing when I lived in…

Worms Riding the Air Waves

Posted on March 26, 2025

He opened up a ledger book. The ledger book looked familiar. Somewhere at my grandmother’s house on the outskirts of Tacoma back in the 1970’s I’d seen one that, it seemed to me, now appeared to have been transported to Amsterdam. I was standing in a narrow and crooked building that had been constructed in the 17th century. It was presently a tourist shop and a UPS pick up point. It was my third attempt at collecting my parcel. “You must file a police report.” The instructions from the Amazon-Ready-Set-Answer department were clear.  My question had been, “Where is my package?” By this point I had already been to a designated pick up point twice.  After two attempts at the pick up point, I…

Pilgrimage

Posted on March 16, 2025

Reading Shakespeare and drinking tea are pleasant occupations. And drinking whiskey and reading Shakespeare are also pleasant occupations. A friend of mine and I meet up every so often and read a play together. We switch the parts freely. She’s a health care professional and during the break between transitioning from the tea to the whiskey part of the evening she said to me, “You know, living with a narcissist ages a person.” She meant literally ages a person physically, mentally and spiritually. I remembered  myself at the age of seventeen when I couldn’t recall what I had done an hour previously. I wasn’t taking medication, I wasn’t under the influence of any substances. In despair I dyed my hair grey for a period…

At the Circus

Posted on March 4, 2025

“Ah,” I thought to myself, sitting comfortably in my assigned seat at Le Carré in Amsterdam.  It was a very nice seat at the back of the royal “loge” section in what used to be the circus theatre. The theater is no longer the home of the circus.  * A few years ago I heard Mavis Staples at Le Carré and that was an exceptional experience. I signed up for a “We Are Public” seat (a subscription service to supplement an audience when sales are poor or the venue too big and Le Carré is huge) only to be told when I showed up to collect the ticket, that all the “plonk butts in seats”  tickets were taken. Quite a few disappointed and audibly…