My writings…
An air of heights, a robust air.
The ice is near, the solitude is terrible

But…how freely one breathes!
How much one feels beneath one!

Philosophy..
is a voluntary living in ice
and high mountains
-a seeking after everything strange
and questionable in existence,
all that has hitherto been excommunicated
by morality.

How much truth can a spirit bear,
how much truth can a spirit dare?

Error is not blindness, error is cowardice…
Every acquisition,
every step forward in knowledge,
is the result of courage,
of severity towards oneself…

            *Nitimur in vetitum

Fundamentally what has hitherto been forbidden
has never been anything but the truth.

Ecce Homo by Friedrich Nietzsche, trans. by R. G. Collingdale, Forward 3

Damn it. Was it a mistake, a failed calculation? Did I underestimate the amount of sugar in that large piece of cheesecake which I consumed? The cheesecake was plain, no berry jam added. (It didn’t taste “that” sweet)

I am insulin dependent, a diabetic. The price my body paid, the result of devouring an overly generous slice of cheesecake, — rising blood glucose which I addressed wide-awake until 2:00 AM. My body functions by a logic of biochemistry. There’s no care whatsoever for rationalizations, no allowance for a “mistake.”

The truth of the matter, I simply desired what my eyes perceived: cheesecake 2x the quantity proper for maintaining in range my blood glucose level. If you are diabetic you will understand.

The quotation from the last of Nietzsche’s writings Ecce Homo, – a wordplay with the quotation from John’s Gospel, the invitation to look, to see a God that is shortly to die. Nietzsche takes the measure of his method of philosophy. Philosophy comes down to a capacity for pain, for having eyes wide open, to the truth which is sometimes uncomfortable, sometimes bitter.

Homo Sapiens, the species of which you and I are members, prefer to have our backs to the truth, to live our entire lives in the heavy, fetid, breathable, common air of the lowlands. The scenery is agreeable, green and lush, maybe even glowing with neon, sparkly like Las Vegas. I am drawn to such an experience, one after another. A living soporific, sleep walking in desire, until my expiration date.

The truth about last night: I simply wanted that overly generous slice of cheesecake.

Cheesecake is never forbidden. Do have another piece?!

The truth is always the forbidden.

*The Latin quote is from Ovid’s Amores.  “We strive after the forbidden.”