My friend, Stevie told me to put my knives away. You know. Don’t leave any knives in the dish drainer tonight. Here’s the details:

Stevie writes:

I heard a feng shui tradition that you are not supposed to leave your washed knifes in your dish drainer out over night for New Year’s Eve because it is a symbol for bringing painful experiences into the New Year or ushering in new ones. I heard this/read it a couple of years ago and i find myself always looking at my dish drainer before midnight…”

I don’t know about you, but I put my knives away, so I’m good to go!

Happy New Year, all!

“You have to remember where I’m from, P. Where I’m from, men look after women. Always. Any man who is a man never hurts a woman and if they do, then they’re not a man,” he said, defining (Saturn) what a man is (Mars).

“I know.”

“Yep. Any man who hurts a woman, gets his ass kicked. This is just the way it is. Men are supposed to take care of women. Like my sisters. My brother and I took care of them. They were not allowed to date unless my brother went along to chaperone. My parents wouldn’t have it any other way. We had to go with them on every date they ever had to make they stayed safe. And we did it. And they stayed safe too. Nothing ever happened to my sisters!”

“I see.”

“Except that one guy, who’s jaw I had to bust. But he was cheating. He cheated on my sister and I caught him and I wasn’t going to let him get away with that. She’s still pissed at me for that, actually. For breaking her boyfriend’s jaw. But she doesn’t know he cheated on her. I never told her. I didn’t want to tell her what he did because I thought it would hurt her if she found out. I thought it would affect her self-esteem so I kept my mouth shut even though she was pissed at me.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah P. And she might not have been so pissed if she knew what he’d done. But I never told her and I still haven’t told her, because like I said. I didn’t want her feeling bad about herself just because this guy is a jerk! So I just busted his jaw to pay him back and then I kept my mouth shut. Because how’s it going to feel if you find out your boyfriend cheated on you? It’s got to be horrible. It can’t feel good, that’s for sure. So I figured she didn’t need to know. I figured I could spare her that much so I just kept my mouth shut and let her be mad at me. Still. To this day, she’s probably still mad at me for that.” He laughed. His sisters worship him.

“I remember that. You told me that.”

“Yeah, you understand. You know how I am. I can’t help, P. I have to take care of women. And children too. There is no choice in the matter. This is the way I was raised and as you know, you can never get rid of your upbringing. You can try if you want to but these things are deeply ingrained. It’s almost impossible to not be like this when this is what you’ve been taught.”

What was deeply ingrained when you were growing up?

Skip to Mars and Saturn in aspect - Competitiveness

Back on the Mars Saturn aspect, when I was 17, I momentarily had nowhere to live, so I moved into the soldier’s barracks. And I had forgotten this entirely until he reminded me when we got in contact a few years ago. How you can forget something like this, I have no idea. I’m a Saturn Neptune type. But once reminded I remembered it vividly. Well some of it.

Last night I was talking to him and more details surfaced which brilliantly illustrate the Mars Saturn aspect.

“I used to guard you in there,” he said.

“What?”

“I would guard you. I would stand guard (Saturn) wherever you went so no men (Mars) would bother you.”

“You did? You guarded me?”

“Yes! Like when you took a shower, I would stand outside and guard you so no one would come in there.”

“What? I took a shower there?” As soon as I said it, I knew it was stupid. Of course I took a shower there. How else am I going to get clean?”

“Yes you took a shower and I would stand outside and let no one in. I want a take a shower, one of the guys would say. No, I’d tell them. You can’t! (Saturn restriction of soldiers / Mars). You’re just going to have to wait (delay) because she’s in there and you’re not going in and if you try, then I guess I’ll have to kill you.

I laughed.

“No one ever tried, so no one ever died. I’m surprised you don’t remember this, P.”

“I do now. I remember that… you doing that now. I was scared (Saturn) of all those men (Mars). They made me very nervous.”

“With good reason. Those men were heathens, P. Most of them. Hell, maybe even all of them. There are all kinds of heathens in the military. Men are dogs and there was no way I was going to let them get anywhere near you. Who knows what they’d do it they if they had a chance, so they weren’t going to have a chance.”

“I see. Well I’m glad you did that. Thanks for guarding me so I could take a shower.”

“You’re welcome. Nothing was going to happen to you on my watch. Nothing at all, I can promise you that. I made sure you were completely safe at all times.”

So there you go. He’s controlling (Saturn) the situation with his prowess (Mars). Threat of violence (Mars) against men not respecting a boundary (Saturn) because he feels it’s the right thing to do (Integrity / Saturn)

Can you relate? Do you have a Mars Saturn aspect in your chart?

skip to What Makes a Man?

I was surprised so few people surfaced to say they had some ritual around enjoying something they enjoy. And I was thinking this must be a Venus Neptune thing. The sensitivity part of it because I realized I do something similar with music.

So am I weird? No. Because then Debby came to the rescue with this comment>:

“I’m like that with music I like. I get the CD and like that wine taster I have to “sniff” it with my ears, taste it and roll it over my musical “tongue” with all its sensors. I listen to one track over and over again for some time. And then I move on to another. It can take me weeks, even months, and in some cases more, to listen to the entire CD.”

Now I do the same thing. I’ll get some music from somewhere… either I’ll order it or someone will send me something and I just let it sit there. Sometimes weeks pass.

Because I want to hear whatever it is. And if my kids are around, forget it! I can’t hear myself think.

And if I’m going on a short trip in the car I might listen. It depends on if I want a quick taste of something. But if I think my experience will be enhanced if I hear a whole cd (or collection of cds) at once, then I’ll definitely wait, indefinitely! Because I’ve got this thing that is going to stimulate me and I want to squeeze the most pleasure possible from it.

Movies, same thing. Books too!

Haven’t you ever put a really good book down at the last chapter, to “save” it? Or slowed down your reading because the book is so pleasurable?

Come on people. Tell me you can relate to this…

~~
pictured - Venus Verticordia. Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1864-1868. Oil on canvas

Dear Double.

Your Sun and Moon are in the 7th house of your chart which gives very strong co-dependent tendencies, basically because you simply do not want to be alone. And this desire to be partnered can be so strong that any relationship, even one that is absolutely horrible like this one, is better than nothing. And if you can understand this, you can begin to untangle your confusion.

See, you are concerned about him and how the two of you relate. You think of the balance and the give and take.

He on the other hand, doesn’t think of you at all. It sounds like he uses your body now and then (gee, thanks) but outside of that it’s pretty obvious not just from the porn but the entire history of your relationship that this is a very self-centered man. So self-centered that your needs don’t even enter his picture. And I have just the words for you.

Recently I read astrologer Michael Lutin’s book, “SunShines: The Astrology of Being Happy”, and my favorite sentence in the entire book was this: “A relationship… a real relationship, takes two people. Not one person and one vegetable…”

::smiles::

I am sorry, but your man is a vegetable. And it seems he has no desire whatsoever to do anything about that, so I think you ought to leave him on the next train. And check this:

Forget his porn. Who cares what he does? What about your own need to be sexually satisfied, hmm? This guy ain’t cuttin’ it!

So I say, get out there and find a man who can… and will. But just watch yourself, okay? Make sure the next man you hook up with has an authentic desire to relate to another human being because if not, you’re going to wind up right where you are now, ‘cept you’ll be another year older.

Good luck.

~~
Have a question? Need advice? Ask here!

Interested in a personal consultation? Click here for more info…

When Jupiter went into Sagittarius it occurred to me to post pictures that illustrate the theme. And since I mentioned my daughter traveled extensively as a baby, I thought I would start with these.

Now my daughter has a 9th house Moon trine Jupiter in Sagittarius which gives a mother lode of this kind of energy… buoyant, international and expansive and you can see her glowing in her element, with these foreign moms (Moon), which was a great benefit (Jupiter) to me at the time.

Because I was breastfeeding! And I was tired! But while traveling, I could hand my baby to just about anyone anywhere and it would be fine. All parties happy! And this persists today. For example, my daughter has family I don’t even know.

I have a friend, Alexa who grew up in an honest-to-God commune. Consequently she has several mothers, a couple dads and more than a dozen siblings. So one day Alexa was running for the school board. And she used to hang with my daughter all the time. Alexa and I carpooled our kids for six years but besides that she spent time alone with her because she got a kick out of her telling me they had a lot in common as fellow Gemini Pigs, but anyway…

I went to a fund raiser to support her campaign and quite a number of her family members were there, with their spouses or whatever. And Alexa was introducing me to everyone and you can imagine my surprise when came to a table of her parents (four of them, anyway) and said, “And these are Mosta’s grandparents..”

Say what? I smiled. How could my daughter have grandparents I have never met?

But I recovered quickly! My daughter travels and finds family (Moon) everywhere she goes. What can I say? That’s a 9th house moon trine Jupiter.

And one more story…

A couple days ago my daughter got a painting from Italy. Uh huh. There is a gal (she can out herself if she wants, I don’t do that) who was so moved by the fact my daughter is ill, she painted her painting and fed-ex’ed the thing clear from Italy. Can you believe this? I can…

Have any Jupiter Moon, 9th house Moon or Moon in Sagittarius stories or pictures?

“Mosta” is a pseudonym. That’s Alexa, my daughter’s “other mother”, with me in the pic.

Dear Wife,

Your life sounds horrendous and I feel very bad for you. However there is only one person in the entire world who can fix it… and that person is you.

Now you do not seem confused. You know exactly how you feel and why you feel that way, so it leaves this question: What are you going to do about it? And you don’t have to come up with a long term and total solution. You can start small.

See, you got here by making a series of wrong decisions. Like you’re driving and you make a wrong turn, then another wrong turn and yet another wrong turn. Next thing you know, you’re in the middle of the woods and completely disoriented. So orient yourself!

You’re 36 years old. Odds are you’ve got another 36 years to live. Would you like to spend them with this man? If so, do nothing. If not, you need to get moving and most definitely this is what I would do. I would be plotting a course out of there so fast, your head would spin. And your kids?

The best thing you can do for your kids is to live a happy life that satisfies because you are teaching them every minute of every day. Your kids will live in whatever track you lay down for them, until and unless they fight their way out, so best to put them in a track to happiness in the first place, yes?

So you are where you’re at. But you have an opportunity now, to set an example for your children. You can show them that you can be down, way down… and you can comeback. You can turn your life around, slowly, methodically and very deliberately, simply by making better choices! By daring to do something new. By daring to discover what a healthy choice looks like and then learning… training yourself to move in the direction. And the astrology?

Saturn is transiting square your Sun in Aquarius, begging you to clutch it up and take responsibility for your life. And as always if you accept this challenge, support will arrive. This is a universal law.

Good luck.

~~
Have a question? Need advice? Ask here!

Interested in a personal consultation? Click here for more info…

Now this is nearly unbelievable and then again, not. As reported a couple times on this blog, the insurance companies are now using astrology to determine who is most at risk of having an accident and therefore a claim. But erectile dysfunction?

You know you want to know: Capricorns Come in Last…

credit for the link goes to astrococktail.com

I got a new box from my ex, the Special Forces guy and have it cooling off as I speak. It was meant for Christmas but arrived late due the blizzard here which is no big deal since I haven’t opened it anyway and have no idea when I might. He’s the Aries in this, so always rushing me. We are both control freaks and the opposition between our Mercury’s is ever present:

“Did you open that yet?” he asked.

“No. No I haven’t and have no idea when I might. I haven’t finished your last box yet.”

“You make too big a deal. It’s just a Christmas present. You’re going to be disappointed.”

“I don’t see how. I am already satisfied, just having it here. Just looking at it with it’s red tape. You put red tape on it and I don’t even have to open it for it to be plenty whatever it is. I’ll see what it is soon enough. Like in a month, or something.”

“A month!” He laughed.

“Maybe. I have no idea what I’m going to do, but as you know it’s my box, the box and whatever is in it so just don’t worry about it. There is really no reason to open it because I am already completely happy. My mood could not be improved so I may as well wait for some other time.”

“You’re an odd one, P.”

“Well I guess I’ve heard that before but in whatever case, no. I have not opened the box yet and have no intention of opening any time soon that I am aware of. I am just too happy having it around the way it is.”

Now what I really think is that the box is full of energy. It most certainly is. Someone took the time to pack it for me, so I would not want to go ripping into to it like some kind of de-sensitized freak. This would be akin to a wine lover opening a bottle 30 year old bottle of wine and taking a mindless swig from the bottle. It’s not going to happen.

I am going to open that box when I have the time and space to give it my full attention so I can fully appreciate the gift and the energy of the giver. I am going to open the box and release it’s contents like a living thing and meantime it gets to be in the room with me, and just knowing it’s there feeds, supports me and makes me feel good.

Do you have rituals like this? Things you appreciate and take the time to savor?

skip to commenting on the comments…

Carl Boudreau who calls himself a “rather over-educated older guy, slouching toward retirement,” maintains a blog here:

Carl Boudreau’s Astrology Blog

He writes a monthly horoscope for each of the signs, (January, 2007) but what I really like is his “500 words” series because is that snappy or what?

Check it out:

500 words about December 2006.
500 words about January 2007

500 words! The man is not wasting anyone’s time.