Woe implores: Go!/ But all joy wants eternity—/ Wants deep, wants deep eternity.

Friedrich Nietzsche was a humorist, moralist, and optimist. Contrary to the lay beliefs about “Nihilism,” his vision of the world requires one to be a contender with life, not a resignator—something that the popularized version of the man neglects. To put it briefly, Nietzsche never intended the phraseologies “God is dead,” or “Life has no meaning” to be justification for escape from the inherent responsibilities of existence, but rather a call to a higher form of existence, a participation with the second and third degrees or beyond. To take heed of his thoughts, or those of others who spoke in such terms, is at the heart of the existential pursuit; this pursuit is both a macro and micro endeavor—interesting, captivating, whether in whole or part.

Infinite return is a concept that states that all things have previously happened, infinitely backwards in time, and will continue to happen infinitely forwards in time. More precisely, it defies that time is linear at all, and makes of this continuum a circle, a wheel, in or on which all things are constantly turning. Inherent in this idea are naturally then feelings of dread, resignation, despair, et cetera; however, we must remember that Nietzsche never proposed such an idea simply to leave it there, as to say, “Things repeat, on and on and on, a thousandfold never to alter, and there is nothing you can do about it, The End.” Rather, he makes this statement and goes further, asks of his reader, “What else?” For it is this else which makes all of the difference in life, in our experiences, in the world as a whole. If, despite the seeming pointlessness of repetition, one can find a deeper meaning each time, then the repetition serves to create layers of richness to our experiences instead of depleting them of all meaning or value entirely. This is what Nietzsche asks of, and I believe hopes, for his reader; he intends to elevate their each and particular lives by pushing them beyond and over the chasms which otherwise could be dreadful and wasteful lives. Remembering this, whilst doing anything, serves to bring us closer to the idyll, (for repetition—circular time—lacks the conflict of linear time) and thus, closer to a feeling of fulfillment and happiness.

If the peddling of nostalgia in its physical manifestation, if the sale of memory incarnate participates somehow with Nietzsche’s thoughts, it is in that the object itself is one small section of this wheel, continuously turned and turning ad infinitum. Interaction with that object allows for one to touch something far greater, lovelier, than a segment of a line; for if a part of a line is touched, it happens, we are moved further along the line, and that moment is forever gone, perhaps remains in memory for a short while, but eventually is erased upon the death of that one. But if that object is seen to be repetitive in a continuum, it can be touched and retouched and handled once again, each time aggregating in meaning and purpose. To be a conduit for this process would be an explicit form of “living” Nietzsche’s ideas, an interesting position in life, for it allows the purveyor to not only themselves have a daily and tangible relation to the parts of the wheel themselves, but also to bring this experience to the public, acting in some ways as a small Zarathustra. In this position, one is the gatekeeper of the idyll, or at least of these small representations of it which brighten our lives and allow us to travel back and forth through the continuum as if we had perfected some beautiful and abundant time machine.

E. Lareau

24 February, 2010