Monday 11/29/2021: Sneak Peek at the Week; Neptune Direct; New Moon/Eclipse in Sagittarius

I hope you had a festive Moon in Leo Thanksgiving. Happy Hanukkah, to all who are celebrating. Next up: a total solar eclipse!

This post-holiday work week is driven by the Moon in Libra, seeking fairness, harmony, and balance in relationships. Planetary patterns over the next several days are indeed less jagged than the first half of November, and most of the action happens today and tomorrow. It goes like this:

  • MONDAY:  Mars trines Neptune at 9:10 AM ET, offering an easy flow of effective action that is supported by vision, music, arts, and healing. Really, just get out there and do it. The afternoon offers more cooperation, as the Libra Moon sextiles the Sun and Mercury at 5:44 PM ET and 6:33 PM ET. The sloppy thought process of Mercury in Sagittarius gets a useful dose of practicality, reflecting a sextile (harmony) between Mercury and Saturn, exact at 2:19 AM ET on…
  • TUESDAY.  Around 2:55 PM ET, there may be a few kinks among the folks who would like to make nice-nice vs. others who prefer to use resources and people as a means to an end, as Moon squares Venus in social-climbing Capricorn. But even that potential conflict is softened by a sextile between Venus and Neptune at 3:48 PM ET, followed by another sextile between Sun and Saturn at 6:14 PM ET. Having succeeded in your quest for world domination by dinner, you can prepare for the potential power play or catharsis that erupts around 10:42 PM ET, as the Moon squares Pluto, followed by a trine to Jupiter at 11:19 PM ET. Chill overnight (in the Americas), as the Moon then goes void until…
  • WEDNESDAY: …at 6:55 AM ET. It then enters Scorpio, driving the next two days with a need for emotional depth and substance. At 8:22 AM ET, Neptune turns direct, ending a five-month period of subtle focus on using your own dreams and intuition for guidance. When a planet is retrograde, the suggestion is to turn inward on issues involving that planet, as opposed to looking outside the self.  You’ll feel the effects of Neptune’s change of station more personally if you were born 20-23  days into Pisces, Virgo, Gemini, and Sagittarius…or if you have a planet or angle at 19-24 degrees of those signs.  What kind of effects? Oh….perhaps you are feeling somewhat bewildered…or less inclined to be in Type A personality mode (if you are normally a Type A personality). You may find yourself needing to express your creativity — even if you have never thought of yourself as a “creative” person. You may also find being of service richly rewarding. Note that whenever a planet changes direction, it pulls focus in the headlines several days before and after. See an uptick in stories of music, drugs, oil, spirits of all kinds, etc? I sure do.
  • WEDNESDAY: around 9:43 PM ET, a dose of reality may break Neptune’s dreamy spell, as the Moon squares Saturn. Wait four hours for the rebellious response, as Moon opposes Uranus at 2:01 AM ET on…
  • THURSDAY. Now we are in the balsamic phase of the lunar cycle, starting to sense a new cycle just around the corner. Such times of little light from the Moon are apt for clandestine meetings, and I suppose that’s doubly true when the Moon is in Scorpio. Sometimes we feel restless or listless on a “dead” Moon, and that may well apply during the early part of the day. The Moon doesn’t make exact connections until late afternoon, but once it gets going, the flow is easy — and perhaps even enthusiastic. At 3:57 PM ET, Moon trines Neptune — there’s your inspiration. Moon sextiles Venus at 5:51 PM ET, and then meets up with Mars at 7:45 PM ET. That’s an assertive focus, and the next stop is to Pluto — the Powers That Be — at 11:25 PM ET. Finally, at 12:22 AM ET on…
  • FRIDAY: Moon squares Jupiter — there’s your enthusiasm or some other Big Thing. Chill during the ensuing nearly seven-hour void. Moon soars into Sagittarius at 7:12 PM ET — seeking to express its boundary-pushing, righteous opinion. But hey — the Moon is dead, and an eclipse is just around the corner. Not only that, but the Moon doesn’t connect with any other planet until 9:45 PM ET. You could wander a bit today, too — out in nature or in your mind, somewhere outside the box. The evening offers opportunities for cooperative efforts when the Moon sextiles Saturn.
  • SATURDAY: Moon meets up with the Sagittarius Sun at 2:43 AM ET. The New Moon is also a total solar eclipse.

Solar eclipses act like a “bottleneck” of energy. Light flowing from the Sun is temporarily interrupted, focusing attention on that interrupted point. As light is held back, something new and possibly fragile may enter the picture and grow. And here I would be thinking of Michael, the kindhearted policeman in the storybook Make Way for Ducklings, who stopped the flow of traffic on Beacon Street so Mr. and Mrs. Mallard and their brood of eight could safely make their way to the Boston Public Garden. Otherwise, they would have been roadkill. Got that?

Often the seeds planted for growth during an eclipse are hidden. Sometime later, when the eclipse is activated by a transiting planet, whatever was planted can make itself known quite suddenly and forcefully. And once it’s out, there’s no going back.

Here’s an example of an eclipse trigger. On January 10, 2020, we had an eclipse at 20 degrees of Cancer/Capricorn. It was a lunar eclipse, offering illumination and release. This is when the novel coronavirus was named and its genetic sequence released. Countries began mobilizing to deal with it. In early March 2020, Jupiter hit 20 Capricorn, followed by Mars on March 17th. That’s when most of the world went into lockdown. Then, on December 14, 2020,  Mars was at 20 Aries for the third time this year (because Mars was retrograde). 20 Aries is a square to 20 Cancer/Capricorn, thus triggering the eclipse again. That’s the day the first Covid vaccine was administered in the U.S. The planet representing the vaccine in the chart for that event is Mars! Meanwhile, in the UK,  a mutation of Covid-19 that spreads faster than the original was identified. Coincidence or conspiracy?

Here’s where this Saturday’s total eclipse will be visible. Here’s what it looks like, set in Washington, D.C.:

 

Observations:

  • With the Moon in Sagittarius, the seeds planted in today’s eclipse involve matters of collective beliefs and righteous opinions. Other Sagittarius themes include publishing, film & theater, sports, foreign affairs, travel, religious dogma, and judicial rulings. This eclipse is the last of a series of eclipses in Gemini-Sagittarius that began in 2020. How have things changed in matters ruled by these signs since then?
  • The Ascendant for this chart in D.C. is Libra, the same as it was for the lunar eclipse earlier this month. Thus Venus is the ruler of the chart, same as it was last time, too — see link for detailed thoughts on that.  Now, however, Venus is at the root of the chart, about to meet up with Pluto, which once again rules the area of the horoscope related to values, assets, and worth. Note that Uranus has moved closer to the area of the chart associated with shared investments, debts, taxes, death, and alternative methods of healing. An upset to the status quo may be on the way.
  • Upsets to the status quo are also suggested by the building tension between Saturn (old guard) and Uranus (avant-garde). The two will make their third exact square on December 24th. The first two happened on February 17th and June 14th — here’s a recap of this very significant pattern. 
  • The eclipse is at 12 Sagittarius — which is the Ascendant in the horoscope most commonly used for the United States. An eclipsed Ascendant suggests a change in the image projected by an entity onto others. Let the record show that the last time we had an eclipse on the U.S. Ascendant was December 4, 2002. What happened in the aftermath? The U.S. invaded Iraq three months later, on a bogus claim that Saddam Hussein had “weapons of mass destruction.” Secretary of State Colin Powell presented this bogus claim to the U.N. on February 5, 2003…the day Mars hit 12 degrees of Sagittarius, triggering the eclipse. This time, Mars will be at 12 Sagittarius on December 30 – 31, so let’s keep an eye out for outbursts of assertive energy around then. Here’s a list of other significant events that happened in February 2003.
  • Bottlenecked energy just waiting to be triggered at a later date is suggested by Mars — strong in Scorpio — sextile Pluto and square Jupiter. Actions may be based on inspiration or delusions, suggested by Mercury square Neptune.
  • The Sabian Symbol for the eclipse is “a widow’s past is brought to light.” It doesn’t matter if the widow is grieving, argue astrologers who have written about this Symbol. She must still be held accountable for past actions, of which the public will be made aware. What is revealed may be accompanied by an outpouring of emotion, though an effort may be made to put on a brave mask of control.
  • If you would like a few paragraphs of personal insights on how this eclipse may manifest in your own personal world, I am happy to provide them. Toss $52 into my Cosmic Tip Jar, and email me your birth data if I don’t already have it. Insights will be delivered to you by the end of the week.

Back to the forecast for the week:

  • SATURDAY: after the New Moon/Eclipse, Mercury meets up with the Moon at 7:43 AM ET, dying to talk about something. Holiday shopping today will produce more creative results than holiday shopping tomorrow. The Moon-Neptune square at 3:22 PM ET may inspire you.
  • SUNDAY: Moon goes void on a sextile to Jupiter at 12:08 AM ET. That could be fun for SNL, provided they were on the night before. Moon goes void for the next six hours, entering Capricorn at 6:30 AM ET. There are no exact aspects for the rest of the day, though the Capricorn Moon is determined to take care of business with its usual hard-nosed practicality.

And now, the news.

With Neptune in focus over the weekend and for the next few days, I found myself suddenly inspired to design a few options for the 2022 Really Useful Mercury Retrograde Survival Guide Bookmarks. You can thank Beth Owl’s Daughter for the nudge, as I did not have one printed up last year. But Beth asked — so stay tuned — and I hope everyone likes the new design. Inquiring minds are wondering how many other Avid Readers were carried away by the creative/inspiring potential. Do tell!

Meanwhile…

Last Monday, at the tail end of all those authoritarian patterns involving Mars and Saturn, not to mention the “Big Idea” potential of Mercury with Jupiter and Pluto, Heather Cox Richardson made sure to tell us that

the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, based in Stockholm, Sweden, released its 2021 report on “The Global State of Democracy.”

The report identifies the United States as one of the democracies that is “backsliding,” meaning that it has “experienced gradual but significant weakening of Checks on Government and Civil Liberties, such as Freedom of Expression and Freedom of Association and Assembly, over time.”​​

“The United States, the bastion of global democracy, fell victim to authoritarian tendencies itself, and was knocked down a significant number of steps on the democratic scale,” the report says.

It is amazing — and also quite sobering — that mundane astrologers anticipated these events so many years ago. Meanwhile, the Biden Administration has scheduled a two-day virtual summit on democracy, to which 110 nations have been invited. The Moon will be in Pisces; the Sun will be squaring Neptune, so we have the potential for a dreamy vision, empathy, and compassion. Potentially.

Other, much more positive news: U.S. News & World Report lists five things about the economy we can be thankful for right now.

Anyhoo…

With a week of no exact aspects among the planets (other than to the Moon), we expected events akin to a glacier shelf suddenly collapsing — just like that. Neptune (in partnership with Pluto) refers to viruses/infection — and just like that, we have Omicron, the latest incarnation of Covid — and it’s a variant with a higher-than-we’ve-seen-before transmission rate.

Jack Dorsey stepped down as Twitter’s CEO this morning — just like that. It’s worth noting that Dorsey’s Sun-Mars at 27-28 Scorpio and his Jupiter at 26 Taurus were impacted by the last lunar eclipse…and transiting Pluto-Eris has been hammering his 24 Libra Moon. In 2022, transiting Neptune will activate all the angles of his horoscope, suggesting a possible disappearing act or involvement with intangibles.

Planetary patterns are often reflected in the obituaries. With Neptune, it’s music, victims, spirituality, fantasy, romance:

Not an obituary, but still in the NYT over the weekend:

Meanwhile...

Remember how the major trials happening over the past two weeks reflected out-of-control aggression suggested by the Mars-Saturn square? This week, reflecting the s*x scandal potential of Mars-Neptune, we have:

Finally, did you know that the key to happiness is…kindness? This story comes around again and again, but it’s especially apt for days with Neptune (charity; selflessness) so hot in the heavens.

OK, that’s it for now. Here’s the 411 on personal consultations –– and yes, gift certificates for everyone on your holiday shopping list are available. I will be raising my rates in 2022 — if you buy now, you can schedule appointments next year.

This year’s version of my Moon void Christmas tree

— mentioned in last week’s forecast. 

Happy holidaze!