Weekly Weather August 20, 2012
On Thursday night, I spent time on a ferry dock bench gazing at the dark sky and dark waters of the Great South Bay. It was a new Moon so no light disturbed the stars peeking out through the intermittent cloud cover. Stars appeared and disappeared above my head. Long Island’s lights twinkled in the far distance. Above me and over the water, bats were swirling and twirling, eating bugs drawn to the ferry dock’s lights. Astrology friends had left on the previous ferry after laughter, beach, a story filled day and an amazing feast we’d made for dinner with farmer’s market abundance. Lots of dishes awaited me back at my house. Dance music was playing from the Mermaid ~ oldies and country ~ what a mix! I knew the words to ALL of them. I lingered, unwilling to leave the darkness and the swirling, dipping, diving bats for the light and chores of the house.
I thought about loss, love and the depths of the cosmos. My friend Jackie’s memorial service is coming this Wednesday. Earlier in the day, I had received emails from the various Woo-Woo Sisters (what we called ourselves) about what we were going to say at her service. Jackie became a Woo-Woo Sister the minute Sonia met her and invited her to a Woo-Woo gathering. We are Woo-Woo Sisters by choice, a group of interesting and dynamic women, connected by a shared interest in metaphysics and the deeper questions of life. We like to play and laugh. We have profound conversations. We have adventures together ~ proposed and planned ~ whether sleeping with wolves upstate at a wolf preserve or at overnighting at the Rubin museum, getting married to ourselves, watching 40s movies while eating popcorn drenched in truffle oil, learning falconry, ghost busting revolutionary war soldiers in Sag Harbor, making absinthe ice cream, or meditating and cooking delicious meals together. Always adventures combined with AMAZING food.
Here’s a picture of the Pasta Puttanesca from a recent summer weekend at Sag Harbor with the Woo-Woo Sisters. Jackie’s cancer was diagnosed on June 1st so she missed the Woo-Woo Pasta Puttanesca meditation gathering. She was recovering from her brain and spinal surgery instead. The Woo-Woos even made me a gluten free version of it! The photo below is the GLUTEN version of the Pasta Puttanesca ~ the one I didn’t eat! I offered to bring Jackie some of the leftover sauce even if it wasn’t the same as eating it outdoors by the beach. Jackie said no, she would look at the photo and imagine she was there. Besides she said, her taste buds were affected by her brain surgery and nothing tasted right any more. On August 1st Jackie was dead. Wednesday we’ll help bury her at her public memorial service and Saturday, the Woo-Woos will gather to send her off from our circle.
My joyful, beloved Woo-Woo group was fractured, spinning, spiraling into a sad space. We’d lost our sister by choice. We’d watched her die in 60 days. And Jackie didn’t want to die. She was SO focused on living. We each separated, in a kind of odd way, to process our individual loss of her as our friend while she was dying. When we met as a Woo-Woo group, she wasn’t there but she was. And she was dying. The space was held. The circle was opened but broken. It was so odd. And the universe, abhorring a vacuum, stepped into fill it that space.
When someone leaves your life, the spot in your chart that they held is opened up. The universe notices. The people in your life connect with your chart energetically so when their energy leaves your life, even for a vacation or because they are dying, those spaces, so used to their energy, seek and find a new version of it. So either a new person arrives or existing person shifts their role and steps into the vacuum. It can be a temporary or permanent shifted person but the vacuum will be filled! The universe notices and sends in the energy to hold the space.
In my case, a male Scorpio friend shifted his role temporarily. He had recently lost a Virgo woman friend to untreatable ravaging cancer. He stepped up to help guide, poke and prod me off the gluten towards a healthier and, hopefully, cancer free future. Of course, it was not lost on me that I was a Virgo woman friend not leading a particularly healthy lifestyle shifting MY role in HIS life because he buried another Virgo woman friend he had lost to cancer. I was coughing my lungs out every time I ate a piece of bread ~ and coughing his ear off. He noticed. He nagged. Or as I prefer to say he suggested things with a strong possibility of a follow up. My Virgo Sun lands in his chart on the planets of change (Uranus) and transformation (Pluto). I added my Virgo energy back into the empty Virgo space in his chart. He filled in where the Woo-Woos and Jackie were.
His frequent emails over the last three months replaced the fractured Woo-Woo Sisters exchanges and our silences as we each processed our grief at losing sister Jackie. Scorpio friend and I talked about astrology, metaphysics, Buddhism, as well as my diet changes. He truly is a Taliesin with his Mercury in Sagittarius on the South Node. I hired a healthy life style nutrition coach and started talking to Danielle about food choices (ArtemisInTheCity.com ~ Danielle’s great!) I detoxed from gluten. I went to the beach. I cleared out VERY old emotional spaces that the gluten apparently self-medicated, kept locked down and locked up. I watched as my hand’s life line start to mend itself and grow back together on my right palm. My left hand has a long, unbroken life line ~potential ~ as I am promised a long life due to my Saturn in the 8th house. However, my right hand’s life line ~ actual ~ is broken and quite fractured at the end. My hand reported my life style was killing me. Now my right hand’s life line is starting to change and reconnect before my eyes. Yes, in less than the two months off gluten, that old life line of mine is fixing itself right up. I can only imagine what is going on inside of me! It is amazing what change does to your being!
Take the time this week to look back at what went on the last few months ~ tie the events in your life back to last November’s events too. Tie it back to the two year, July 31, 2010 Mars/Saturn cycle finishing up in your life now. Tie it back in seven year increments ~ all the way back to 1982/83 when Saturn was last at these degrees of Libra. In 1982/83, my beloved mother died of untreatable bowel cancer spread way too far through her body. My birth family was fractured as the hub of my family’s wheel, my mom, died. We recovered. We moved on. Now my friend family of choice is fractured as Jackie died. We will recover. We will move on. I am making lifestyle changes to move towards a healthier lifestyle. I scheduled my next colonoscopy. I noticed Scorpio male friend’s chart has marked similarities to Jackie’s and to my mother’s charts particularly around the nodal, Moon and Virgo points. He helped birth me to a healthier lifestyle, changed my diet, offered support and connection during a very difficult life passage. It WAS a birth actually. After all, he IS my mother. Gotta love it ~ astrology is so cool. And the Universe supports us, even when we feel we are falling.
So ahead of me are two memorial services. At the first, the public one on Wednesday, I will be fine. I will be speaking for the Woo-Woos. At the second service, the first gathering of the Woo-Woos since Jackie died; I will be a complete and total mess. But it is all okay. It is part of life. And I wouldn’t give up a minute of it ~ sadness, tears, joys or laughter. As Nietzsche wrote we should embrace our existence so completely, with such total ecstatic honesty, that we would gladly repeat, endlessly, every moment of our lives, whatever the pain. Garth Brooks says it beautifully in this song.
So here we all sit, each at the edge of our own ferry dock. Part of our old life is done, finished, kaput and over. Saturn is leaving Libra for Scorpio. Our new life beckons, whispers, calls us. Trust the process that has gone on in your life. Watch the bats in your life eat the bugs. Gaze at the great dark void of water and darkness before you. Know that as you go forward into that void ahead, whatever it is, you will come to a new life, a new beginning and receive support and guidance from the heavens. We will recover. We will move on. It is time to get up, go back to the lights of the beach house and wash the dinner dishes. It always comes back to doing the dishes. And as you wash, you connect to the shared memories and love of a delicious meal full of laughter and good conversations spent around a kitchen table with family and friends.
See how the Universe or your chart or however this darn place works, stepped into, stepped up, and arrived to help make you conscious, whole and clear about the different kinds and types of relationships in your life. Choose the positive vision of what happened. Apply an upbeat spin to it. Reframe or tell that story to yourself so you are the hero of your life’s journey. Listen to your inner Taliesin spin the tale of your life so you can see the magic and the mystical moments in it. Understand how what happened was for your greater good even if it might have involved loss. Our losses are often our most profound teachers. So IF you lost someone or something you loved during this Saturn passage through Libra, as so very many of us did, this song by Sugarland is help you get up off your knees (Saturn rules KNEES) and move on. You can do it. It is time to move on. And if you realized you were actually recovered from a huge loss, as I did, it serves as a reminder and memory of times gone by and how far you have come. When you laugh again, you know you are healed.
So last week, we all got through one of the toughest emotional weeks of the year. Here we are on the other side!!! WE DID IT!! Give yourself a pat on the back, a hug, a round of applause or a medal for showing up. You did it! And I don’t care HOW messy you think you were or it was … you did it. You got through it. No one can take that away from you.
Last week brought revelations, epiphanies, ah hA! Moments ~ situations where you got the message that Saturn has been trying to give to you over the past two years while he moved through the sign of Libra. You cleared something. You saw something. Perhaps something in you was finally set free from captivity. Or perhaps you lost something or someone precious to you. Or maybe you figured out a message from Saturn that you’ve been working on your entire life. It could have been that big.
Imbedded in last week was a delicious, delicate, difficult and profound passage through deep emotions. Venus in Cancer answering to the Moon in Cancer at the beginning of the week brought us through an emotion dive deep into our most primitive and unconscious feelings as first the Moon and then Venus moved through the gauntlet of Neptune, Pluto, Uranus and Jupiter. Mars joined with Saturn to end an existing situation or relationship. Mars and Saturn also started a new cycle of how you will deal with your relationships going forward. Every ending has the seeds of the new beginning in it.
We all got to see how we currently deal with our deepest emotions. We all HAVE deep emotions. The question Saturn asked us was how do we work with, process, handle or connect with our deepest emotions NOW that we are two years through his current journey in Libra and however far we are through our life.
Essentially, you look to your Moon and your Cancer ruled house to see the answer. Of course, aspects to the Moon are important too. And make sure to tie in that lovely Nodal cycle ~ it is all about how we connect our Sun to our Moon as we move through our ego and our emotions and their interactions.
So think about your Moon sign and the emotions that rolled through you last week about the profound relationship(s) in your life that is testing you right now. What happened? What did your emotional nature do? What did you do with YOUR emotions around it? Did you stand in them? Wallow in them? Work in them? Run from them? Get angry at them? Express them? Hide them? Nurture them? Connect to them? Fight them? Talk about them? Feel them? Cry in them? Distance from them? Float in them? Get lost in them? All good. In fact, your answer is relatively unimportant. The HOW you dealt with the emotions is tied to your essential emotional nature. You are NOT going to change that. Your Moon is your Moon.
The important question is once you went through the lunar emotions, what did you decide about YOURSELF RELATIVE to the relationship that was testing you? Remember Saturn sent us, in the form of a person or situation, an opportunity to clarify, structure, build, create, frame and set limits around our relationship issues. I want you focusing on what you did relative to the relationship based on your emotional reaction.
Raven Kaldera in his excellent book Myth Astrology says about Saturn in Libra: “Saturn is the planet of karma, and sometimes our karmic relationships don’t end up as happily-ever-after lovers. Sometimes one has to learn that being on friendly terms with someone, with no hatred between the two of you, and having learned something about yourself from the affair is a good definition of success in relationship.”
“In our world, where we are force-fed the happily-ever-after myth from the cradle on, it’s hard for us to accept a friendly breakup unless we can believe there was never much passion to begin with. We find it hard to imagine deliberately disciplining our anger and pain, putting all our effort into trying to salvage some friendship at least, being a good counselor and friend to the one who used to share your life completely. It seems like too much of a demotion, but this is a Saturn in Libra lesson: don’t waste a perfectly good friendship just because of a romantic disillusionment. Saturn hates waste. And Saturn in Libra hates to waste a human connection. “
Raven continues: “Relationships are the situations where you work out your karmic debts and lessons. Sometimes Saturn believes in this so strongly, if only on an unconscious level, that people will avoid relationships entirely because they don’t have the strength for yet another learning experience. When Saturn is in Libra, we are drawn to other people who openly flaunt faults that we have but repress and deny. Other people are our harsh mirrors. We are driven to keep looking into the mirror until we finally see our self in it, whole and happy. “
“Saturn in Libra is the embodiment of grace under pressure. In order to cultivate true grace, one has to have some moral spine, some conviction about how things ought to be. One also has to have the strength to actually walk one’s talk while not alienating those lesser beings who can’t seem to make that struggle work.”
So think about Raven’s words. How did you handle the relationship that went so off the tracks over the past few weeks? Or has been going off the tracks since last November? Or going off the tracks for the last two years? Or perhaps been bumpy and rocky for a long time…. Look back in seven year increments. There is not a right and wrong here. The relationship was there to help you figure out something very important ABOUT YOURSELF. Truth be told, the relationship story had NOTHING to do with the other person. They were simply a mirror for you.
What Raven and Saturn were just saying is “I am holdin’ up a mirror so you can see yourself in it ~ hopefully whole and happy. Or at least so you can see yourself heading toward whole and happy. What do you see? Just askin. Just saying. Just say what you see!”
And if you don’t know quite what you are seeing and can’t sort it out, call an impartial friend, preferably compatible with your chart ~ fire with fire, earth with earth, water with water, air with air etc. Call someone who loves you AND sees you clearly AND who doesn’t have a dog in the fight. Call someone who wants the best for you, sees your flaws yet loves you as you are. Say “I need a bit of help here getting clear … can we talk?” And hopefully, that conversation will help you get needed perspective. And if not, call the next person who loves you dearly and wants the best for you. We are all being mirrors for each other right now. Use your favorite mirrors for guidance.
Of course, there WILL be a coda or epilogue to your Saturn in Libra story when Saturn passes the degree of his January station on October 1st. Saturn in Libra isn’t 100% finished but essentially, the energy is deflating, moving out, moving on, leaving from this cycle. All the teaching has taken place. The final episodes are starting. Around October 1st, there will be something about Libra and Saturn needing to have a final word or message so you can truly put things in proper perspective. And right after that Saturn in Scorpio invites you into his depths of transformation.
Our week ahead and in all the weeks between now and when Saturn dives into Scorpio’s waters in early October, we wrap up our Saturn in Libra journey. We put the pieces in place for the next chapter which is soon to begin. We start to scout out our new location, Saturn in Scorpio. We are essentially done with Saturn in Libra. Saturn turns his shaggy head, smiles a no teeth showing smile and with his eyes twinkling encourages us to move along now, move along. Essentially, it is full steam ahead into Scorpio and our 37 month journey in the dark, deep emotional waters of profound connection, obsession and transformation. As Saturn travels through obsessive Scorpio we will learn to change our inner world ~ just let go of the dilemma before us and trust that fate will take care of it. We will learn to how to rebirth ourselves. We will learn when to let go. And in doing so, we will find the divine light of inspiration. But we are getting ahead of ourselves…
Next up is THIS week’s energy. Mars shifts signs and leaves Libra to enter Scorpio on Thursday. Mars is SO RELIEVED to be out of Libra where he had to be nice, chivalrous and kind. That knight in shining armor job can be a complete pain in the butt. I always kind of felt sorry for King Arthur as he had to get relative thugs to be knights ~ no pulling women off by their hair and having their way with them. You have to read poetry, court and dance with them if you are their white knight. Mars in Libra, at his best, sets an example that being strong and kind doesn’t mean you have to be coarse and brutal too.
Now Mars has time for some true and gritty action in his favorite sign of Scorpio. Back to the dark, fun Scorpion stuff he loves so much. Mars IS acting as an Indian scout for the upcoming journey of Saturn through Scorpio. Mars is riding ahead, through the sign of Scorpio, between now and October 7th, to see what Saturn will be dealing with for the next 37 months. As Mars gallops through Scorpio, he will be sending out smoke signals of what you are going to be dealing with during your trip with Saturn. Mars will trigger 0 to 2 degrees of Scorpio (and all the other signs in your chart) this week. So watch any planets at those degrees carefully from Thursday through Sunday. You will be getting the first smoke signals of what Saturn in Scorpio holds for your planets at 0 and 2 and you based on what Mars runs into this week. It’s the early warning signal. We will continue to watch Mars as he goes through Scorpio. He’s going to be laying the traps and lures which Saturn will set off or explode as he travels through Scorpio for 37 months starting in October.
Mars trines Neptune, whispering about your dreams in your ear. Pay particular attention to your dreams. They will be speaking about Neptune’s upcoming 14 year journey through Pisces. We will start to work on the new dreams in earnest once Saturn gets to Scorpio and trines Neptune. Right now it is all talk and loose dreaming. Pay attention to the images, whispers and phantoms in your mind triggered and activated by Mars. When Saturn gets there in October, he’ll start to make those dreams concrete and real.
Sun enters Virgo on Wednesday and brings with that transition a sense that summer IS almost over. It is time to get back to work doing our job here on planet earth. The first breath of fall is in the air. We are in the mutable month that changes us from hot summer to cool fall. At the same time, Mercury clears his shadow on Wednesday the 22nd to wrap up the various communication issues that have been bounding around you all summer. Mercury, ruler of the Sun in Virgo, clears his shadow just as you start looking around for what you want to do next. You will be guided by Mercury in Leo. The cosmic patterns dance and shift and invite us to change yet again.
Mercury entered his Shadow on June 25th and was retrograde between July 14th and August 7th. While Mercury was traveling through Leo, he brought consciousness to your ego needs and how you are to shine going forward. He helped you see something clearly. Mercury perhaps asked you to look at something you hadn’t looked at in a very long time. I know Mercury in Leo and I went in and cleaned out my Venus/ Saturn conjunction with a resounding square of psychological consciousness. And combining his Leo clarity with the South Node in Gemini, Mercury shook the foundations of how you think about yourself and your past. Combining Mercury in Leo as the ruler of the North Node in Sagittarius, we release old ideas or images of ourselves and shot forward. In my case, I went in and cleared out a couple of very old and dusty emotional places ~ one from 1993-94 when a relationship ended very badly and the other time from 1974-75 around an event that happened when I was in college. I had the help of a few lovely, kind friends ~ who of course were Geminis/ Sagittarians, had nodes in Gemini/Sagittarius, or Mercury / Jupiter strong in their chart. The dusty emotional places involved Geminis. And, as I type this, we are waiting for my beloved uncle Cliff to die ~ he arrived in my life on the Gemini/ Sagittarius Nodes when I was 2. I used to follow him around begging him to read me books. Ah you have to love astrology….all perfect in perfect time.
The South Node sweeps out of Gemini and the North node out of Sagittarius on August 30th so many of our Gemini and Sagittarian stories will conclude or resolve then. Expect lots of deaths and departures of writers, explorers, poets, priests, religious leaders, athelets, publishers, communicators, story tellers and travelers. Then the Nodes of Fate will enter Taurus and Scorpio (remember they move backwards) from August 2012 until February 2014.
So forward we go. You saw what you saw. You did what you did. You said what you said. It happened. Hopefully, you have clarity. If you are still not clear, call someone who loves you and talk it over with them. Look for friendly mirrors that have your best interest at heart. Hold your relationships gently in your heart. Be grateful for them even if they are kind of messy and not so clear right now. Be gentle with yourself too. Kind. Be kind. It’s a hard world out there. We need kindness. And if we can spare a bit of it, offer kindness to the person having a hard time near to you.
Void Moons This Week
3:13 am EDT August 22, Wednesday to 3:54 am EDT
5:34 am EDT August 23 Thursday to 6:50 am EDT August 24, Friday
All Day Void Moon on Thursday
2:39 am EDT August 26 Sunday to 9:58 am EDT
Monday Moon’s day August 20 find Moon in Libra with a closing aspect of a sextile to Sun. This diplomatic, relationship based and working Moon travels thorough the gauntlet of Jupiter, Uranus and Pluto. Moon today will help you clarify what exactly happened last week. Apologies, tokens of peace, and simple outreaches with a kind heart are accepted if offered. People only want to be loved. And we are so afraid to show our vulnerability at times. Back when a beloved friend’s brother dropped dead of a misdiagnosed aneurysm at 35, I was feeling very inadequate to the task of what to do or say. Another friend, Rita said “Anne, this IS what our friends are for. They are supposed to sit with us and love us during our hard times. It is easy to be a friend during the easy times.” I always remember Rita’s words when I am feeling inadequate to the task. This is when you find out who your friends are. It is a very busy day with lots of aspects so plan on running from morning to night as fast as you can run. Mars has an inconjunct to Admetos ~ asking him to adjust his behavior and decide how he wants things to end. Dreams are talking to you… make sure to listen to them and pay attention to their messages. Sun is parallel to Mercury so even when we think we know everything, we find out maybe the world has a few surprises in store for us. Open your mind to explore a different approach to the situation at hand. Saturn in Scorpio is going to make you give up control…. That is what he does. So start practicing now. Be prepared but not in control. Mercury also connects with the Nodes so you find out something you didn’t know about. All good. It’s an invitation. You can take it or not. Your call… but as your astrologer I would suggest you say yes and at least listen to the invitation with an open mind and heart. Sun’s opening square to Admetos sitting on Algol offers an option or opportunity to take action to repair a situation where you or the other person lost their head OR ran into Medusa’s fierce snakes OR got irritated that Athena who you liked better in warrior goddess mode got all emotional on you. It is time for all of us to integrate the two parts of our being ~ the masculine and feminine parts of your being ~ into a productive whole. Athena had to figure out how to do it after she turned Medusa into a snake headed beast. Athena made amends by incorporating Medusa’s slain head into her shield. As Raven Kaldera says “Saturn in Libra is the embodiment of grace under pressure. In order to cultivate true grace, one has to have some moral spine, some conviction about how things ought to be. One also has to have the strength to actually walk one’s talk while not alienating those lesser beings who can’t seem to make that struggle work.” Be nice to the lesser beings around you. Be kind. Pluto’s contra parallel and Mercury’s trine to Pallas Athena allows us to work with her energy constructively rather than banishing her. Pallas Athena figures things out. She does the work. Sun works cooperatively with Mars today too… time for the last bits of being a knight or lady in shining armor. Stand tall. Walk your talk. You can do it. Do you REALLY want to have things end this way?
Mars day, Tuesday August 21 finds Moon in Libra still working under those bustling aspects from yesterday as it continues to swirl. There is an ending tonight when the Moon gets to Saturn. Or an emotional break through. Or perhaps both. There are multiple versions of the truth as people always see the truth from their own chart’s perspective. Listen to the various versions of truth. What is YOUR truth? Saturn in Libra is the embodiment of grace under pressure. In order to cultivate true grace, one has to have some moral spine, some conviction about how things ought to be. One also has to have the strength to actually walk one’s talk while not alienating those lesser beings who can’t seem to make that struggle work. Health matters can take a turn for the worse.
Mercury’s day, Wednesday August 22 is transition day. Moon in Scorpio brings intensity to the energy of the day. Mercury leaves his shadow today starting a new wave of consciousness. Sun enters Virgo extending his hand to each of us and asking what DO we want to work on or in during the next season of our life? Mercury’s quintile to the South Node suggests we take our learning and use it to help us make that plan. Mercury does have an argument with Mars as they face off across the equator. Don’t go driving things away out of spite. Listen to the silence of Pluto… transformation is NOT easy. But transform we must. Mercury’s harmonious aspect to Saturn says win, lose or draw ~ no, no, no… take it out of win /lose. It is about communication. Connecting. Learning. Relating. Leading by example not brute force. Inviting collaboration. How can you invite a different vision in? It’s all about the reframe. It is about seeing it in a different way. Just ask. Just say. Just try it. Reframe “nagging” into “suggesting with a strong possibility of follow up.” It sounds so easy yet is so hard. One of my favorite astrologers in the world is Caroline Casey, an expert at reframing and collaborating consciously. We were in a van going to the Denver airport after an Astrology convention. At the same time, there was an orthodontist convention in town. Caroline, with her purple hair and gentle relatedness was sitting next to a very conservative looking orthodontist and his wife. The wife asked if Caroline was an orthodontist. “No, I am an astrologer. I was here at the astrology convention. Are you an orthodontist?” The wife answered, “No, my husband is an orthodontist. We were here at the convention.” Then the wife asked a question or two to clarify EXACTLY what Caroline said “astronomy or astrology?” “As in reading birth charts cast for the moment you took your first breath.” A bit more dialogue ensued. Then Caroline did what she does best ~ she united. Caroline said, “Well actually astrologers and orthodontists ARE in the same line of work.” At this, the VERY conservative orthodontist husband, who was sitting military straight between Caroline and his wife, arched his eyebrow, and turned to look, for the first time, at Caroline. She paused. The woman can deliver a line like no one else I know. Everyone in the van stopped to listen. We were ALL eavesdropping! It was like those old EF Hutton commercials. And Caroline leans forward, looks at the wife, leans a bit across the husband’s stomach and says, conspiratorially, “Yes, we both straighten people out. Astrologers and Orthodontists both help people who want to be straightened out get straight.” Find the collaborative moments in today. Unite instead of divide. Partner collaboratively instead of fighting. Mercury’s sextile to Jupiter wants to help straighten you out today. Allow the two of them to help you connect in a broader and wider sense to your life. Listen to the stories you hear and how they help and offer you healing, a sense of unity in the world.
Jupiter’s day Thursday August 23 Moon in Scorpio is INTENSE… she’s helping Saturn process emotionally during the all-day Void moon. Mars finally gets the hell out of Libra mid-day and feels so much better. Sun squares the Nodes of Fate ~ again an opportunity to release, change, evolve. Choose the higher path. See the patterns in your partnerships as Pallas in Aries is approaching an conjunction to Uranus and arguing with Juno. Are you using your parents partnership model? Your own model? What IS your understanding of partners now that you are at the back end of Saturn in Libra. Health matters can take a turn ~ for better or worse with Chiron’s aspect to Astraea. DO NOT FOOL around with any health issues today. March yourself right to the doctor and deal with it. Mercury’s contraparallel to Neptune makes you think it was all a dream, an illusion, it didn’t really happen did it? Look for the message ~ it’s there. Mercury was taking you on a journey of consciousness. Mars enters Scorpio at 11:24 am EDT ~this transition always means action pops some place (where Mars is angular). And of course, Mars sets off all the 0 degree planets in your chart… notice what gets triggered for you. Venus has a moment of choice around the Nodes of Fate. The choice is not an easy one as her aspects are stressful to the Nodes. You’ll find you might still want it but you don’t want it to be the way it used to be. So express what you need ~ ask for the change. You haven’t gone through two plus years of Saturn kicking your butt in Venus’ sign to NOT ask. Show Saturn you learned your lesson. Ask for the change you want in your path, destiny or fate. Make sure to allow space to accommodate Mercury’s contraparallel to Uranus ~ this can be explosive words where people completely let loose ~ this is a declination aspect BUT both Mercury and Uranus are in fire. So things can FLARE up as fire is prone to do. It can be like one of the fire lines they build when fighting wild fires out west… watch for the flare. Hopefully, the fire won’t jump the line. It will be clarifying and clear sighted too if you don’t catch ON fire!
Venus’ day Friday August 24 finds Moon in Sagittarius with a lovely closing sextile to Saturn offering solid support and emotional illumination. Sagittarius Moon is a philosopher… so listen to the wisdom that comes your way the next few days. Lots of aspects today so another busy, busy day. Mercury’s contraparallel to Jupiter wakes us with inspiring if disturbing dreams. Mars has an adjusting aspect to the South Node of Fate ~ it is a great day to shred, release papers, Geminis, things you no longer want to carry forward. I love this energy for letting things go. It kind of super power launches forward. Mercury has a functioning and beautifying aspect to Vesta. Vesta is on the world axis so prominent or famous people move today or are talked about. Exposure is possible. The Mars aspect to the Node, especially from Scorpio, indicates a desire to black mail or publish or talk about people with less than honorable intentions. Be careful. Be conscious. This is the kind of day when you write something snarky about someone and then send the email to them. And no, Mercury is NOT retrograde or in his shadow but he wants attention. Don’t feed it and it will vaporize. If you feed it, it will only get worse. Mars is in Scorpio triggering the 1 degrees in your chart, foretelling Saturn’s journey. Sun’s opposition to Neptune allows you to see a situation clearly. The fog lifts. The veil dissolves. Trust what you are being shown. If you think back to what they said way back when, you knew this was a possibility. Isn’t it why you kept your identity shrouded or hid that important part of your being? I can recall a wise therapist pointing out to me that perhaps on SOME LEVEL my soul or inner being knew to proceed with caution which is why I had not committed. Look at your ambivalence here. It holds a message for you. Sun is BRILLIANT to Uranus…. Woo hoo! We GET it!! Allow the knowledge to inspire you. And make sure to write it down so you don’t forget it down the line…. You know how that goes. Mercury is making Venus a bit crazy as he keeps blurting stuff out of his mouth. Mercury knows he has to pitch ~ pitch the deal or be lost forever. It IS a GREAT idea. Allow it to percolate and burble along. And Sagittarius Moon means even old Venus is going to be blushing once she realizes what she actually said. Venus’ aspect to Neptune allows for misinterpretations, embarrassments or flying imaginations. One time, in a diner, I was telling my friend Ed about a sweat lodge I had recently attended. It was during a women’s retreat. We’d gotten up in the middle of the night to go through the process. You crawl naked into this hot, hot, space. Sweat. Release. Chant. Wail. Talk. Crawl out and stand naked around a fire burning in the woods, surrounded by the darkness of the woods. Cool down. Drink Water. Crawl back into the sweat lodge. You repeat the crawling in, sweating, cool down process several more times. All the time a drummer, sitting near the fire, beats a human heartbeat, Dub, dub, Dub, dub, sound on a drum. As the sun rose, we all crawled out of the lodge for the last time and rolled around naked in the morning dew covered grass. For me, it was a PROFOUND spiritual experience of release at the end of a very difficult life passage. As I graphically described my experience to my friend Ed, he stared at me, grinning wider, and wider and more lasciviously. I concluded with “And then we helped pick the grass off each other.” So Ed says, “Let me get this right ~ 20 naked women in the woods? Rolling around? Rolling, naked, in the grass? Getting wet with the dew? And then you picked the grass off of each other?” I answered “Yes.” Then I actually LOOKED at him. Ed had completely taken my profound spiritual experience to a WHOLE NEW place that involved 20 naked women rolling around in dew covered grass. And THAT is what can happen with the aspects today. So if it does, let it fly…. The Universe is trying to give you a good laugh. Laughter is how you know you are alive.
Saturn’s day Saturday August 25 finds Moon in Sagittarius still chuckling over yesterday. Mars leaps out of bed and wants to clear out the house. It is a GREAT day for dumping stuff. Fabulous for road trips to clear out storage units. Great to set up new stuff in your home too. You have a vision of what you want. Mars is in Scorpio triggering the 1 degrees in your chart, foretelling Saturn’s journey. Mercury can have harsh words or work with dark, releasing forces today as he aspects Hades. Pallas Athena has a profound aspect of deep emotional merging this evening as she connects with Poseidon. The intellect needs to be left behind for the depths of emotional, psychological and physical release. Have your own symbolic sweat lodge. Release. Release. Release.
Sun’s day Sunday August 26 finds the Moon in solid, reliable if depressive Capricorn. Venus in Cancer pulls the Capricorn Moon into help stabilize Saturn in the last degrees of Libra. It is another busy, busy day. Mars is in Scorpio triggering the 2 degrees in your chart, foretelling Saturn’s journey. You can have profound dreams tonight where patterns emerge and reemerge as Moon want to work with you and take you traveling in your sleep tonight. It is a good night for astral travel to stop and visit others. Mars has a trine to Neptune bringing in some AWESOME imagery, dreams and ideas. Let them expand. Write them down if they wake you up. There is a gathering of the tribe that can take place today. Jupiter’s supportive energy with Zeus allows all manner of connections. Reach out to people you miss or want to have more of a relationship with when Saturn goes into Scorpio. Sun meets the Nodes of Fate so pay attention to who you meet today. Or to the ideas or inspirations that come flying into your brain. Mercury and Mars talk today and cross inspire each other. You can connect the dots. Lots of action with the Moon as she offers productive interpretations, takes actions and spouts ideas out of her brain as she trines Neptune, Mars and the Sun in the afternoon. Moon goes through the gauntlet of Pluto and Uranus at the end of the day, concluding with some sad news or a difficult phone call in the evening.
Copyright © 2012 A. C. Ortelee
