This is a blog. Just yesterday, and all the previous years of my life, I was not part of the blogosphere. Now I am. Today I will puzzle over the words of a great philosopher. Be forewarned. After reading the rest of this entry, you will likely feel that you have lost a minute or two of your life. (I know that feeling myself - although it occurred last year after watching the movie version of Miami Vice. I am still lamenting those two hours that I will never get back.)
Friedriche Nietzsche once said: "If you stare long enough into the Abyss, the Abyss stares also into you." I tried this over the weekend. How did I do this? As far as I know, there are no abysses around the Boston area. (The closest, to my knowledge, is probably the Labrador Plain.) I do know, however, of a few deep wells in New Hampshire where you can't see to the bottom. So, I went up there and spent a long time staring, but alas, I did not sense that the abyss was staring back at me, let alone "into" me. After a few hours I was cold and hungry so I went home to get something to eat.
I don't know what abyss Nietzsche was staring into. Perhaps it was the same one as in the film "The Abyss" (1989) with all those funny looking translucent blue aliens wafting about in the black ocean. Or, truth seeker that he was, he ignored his pangs of hunger, became delirious and started seeing things. Either way, in my experience, if you stare long enough into the abyss, you will get hungry and eventually will go inside to eat some soup or a bologna sandwich.
