Happy Monday. Today’s image for Taurus 21° is A Finger Pointing To A Line In An Open Book. It’s about discerning a belief system, what, in the open book of philosophy and/or religion can you point out as being meaningful to you. We are under Gemini rule today in a twelve-fold sequence; the sign is ruled by Mercury, communication, logos, the word; it is mutable-air, information, random ideas. Today’s oracle is a bit of a bible dip, isn’t it? And we are pinpointing ideas, in that great book, to which our own response might be: “Word.”

I also think this oracle is about looking at ourselves, objectively, as an open book. And pinpointing observances on ourselves, even our mistakes or negative behavior, from which we can glean lessons that will serve us moving forward. Let me give you a for instance. I grew up with one sibling, a sister, who was perpetually mean to me. She was a mean girl, plain and simple. And despite the fact she tried to metaphorically kill me at ever turn in life growing up I was predisposed to try and find the love and to forge a relationship with her. It never worked; and to be honest I don’t know if she’s living or dead as we’ve been estranged for a dozen years or more. There came a time when I just stopped beating my head against that door, because I got hurt in the process. Every time. Now you’d think that was that. However, I’ve just recently discovered (“that I like toast”…no that’s not right) that there is a line in the open book that is me that reads: You have been projecting this relationship with your sister onto other people all throughout your life.

Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. This thought is so simple, and the fact so obvious. And yet I missed this notion all these years. I have had a few so-called “best friends” in my life but they’ve all been some variation on my sister the mean girl and the addict. Now look, I have compassion for addicts. Who among us isn’t an addict in some form or other? But that winning combination of being mean-spirited and an addict always seemed to be the two main ingredients in those I chose as these so-called best buds. It is painful and somewhat embarrassing to admit, but there you have it. The good news is, as one grows older, the notion of having a best friend is fairly anathema to experience; and yet I think—finger pointing to yet another line in open book—I have weirdly tried to find or create best-friendships in some sort of expression of arrested development, attracted to those who put that energy out there, too; when, in fact, if an adult is doing that, they are no doubt suffering from some arrested development all their own. And I have typically attracted those who feel I’m some sort of funny, entertaining uplifting entity, if not a joker or dinner theater, a sort of personification of lexapro, as another hallmark of these would-be best-friend folk I’ve attracted is that they all turn out to be depressives. Which then sheds light on my sister’s situation: She was likely undiagnosed manic-depressive or bipolar. Just as my parents were addicts. Hello ACOA.

Back to the bible dipping and more universal application of this Sabian symbol: We bible dip when we seek guidance. In other words, if yesterday was about cosmic signposts or divine signatures spontaneously appearing to us, then today is about actively participating, indeed trying to ignite, some spontaneous sign from above. A little bit of this sort of thing goes a long way. We may pull a Tarot card each day and connect with it’s relevance to what’s going on inside of us. It’s typically uncanny. Or, as I’m attempting to do here on a shared level, we might look for some form of guidance that can be absorbed as a group—these symbols are meant to speak to all of us; and you will have your own personal takes on them, while we can all seek to connect on their universality. But, as Dane Rudhyar points out, and I quite agree, an overreliance on this sort of thing can be dangerous or damaging and can “lead to a schizoid state of over-subjective dependence on signs or omen”. None of us want to go there. Although, again, I tend to be a magnet for those who do. And I believe that those who over-identify with any kind of scripture or organized religion are likewise off their tree.

We should be pointing a finger, pinpointing, picking and choosing bits of different religious, philsophical or cultural information that resonates with us, and leaving the rest. This is how we build our own belief system, line by line. So here I disagree with Rudhyar who sees this is a symbol of Subservience To Collective Values; I think it is rather about the Observance and Collection of Values. Whether we are pulling out lines from books or the occasional self-help literature (over reliance on this, too, can be an illness) or consulting with Starsky + Cox or any other metaphysical practitioners or from church sermons or guided meditation or from the off message on a passing bus, we are meant to view it as winged Geminian information, bits and pieces of which should be built into something sustaining, as birds, which are ruled by this sign, would form into a secure nest. It is our belief system that will come to inform those with whom we surround ourselves intimately, immediate family and friends being ruled by Gemini just as Mercury rules the quicksilver immediacy of time with which winged information flows.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Wisps of Wing-Like Clouds Streaming Across The Sky is today’s Sabian symbol for Taurus 20°. It is about cosmic forces revealing themselves to us. You know, when you ask for a sign, I find, you typically get it. If you have been evolving and making positive changes in your life you can expect a signpost from the universe. There’s nothing weird in this. Again I am keep these posts purposefully short. Someone said this is the new discipline regarding the blog: my not writing too much. It’s a busy time.

I really think this twelve-fold sequence is bearing out. If yesterday’s oracle of purification was associated with Pisces then today at 19° Taurus we have A New Continent Rising Out Of The Ocean which comes with yet another time around the wheel starting with Aries today. The sign of Aries, the physical body, does indeed rise from the watery womb of Pisces, the mutable-water sign. So here today we are witnessing new potentiality after, as our ever cheerful Dane Rudhyar puts it, crisis. I guess there was crisis? Yesterday definitely felt a bit weird. A step in the staircase leading to our loft broke under foot as I was climing the stair. That freaked me out. When stuff like that happens, it feels like a rip in the fabric of reality a bit. I think that’s all we need to signal crisis. Something had to give, literally. I think I mentioned I did some emotional house cleaning, ridding myself of relationships with some really awful people who had treated not just me but those I love really unkindly. At first I thought I was fine just never speaking to them again, but I suddenly found myself addressing them and airing my grievances and wow did that ever feel good. I’ve been sleeping like a baby since. It does feel like a new era. I’m going with that.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

I’m purposefully keeping these entries short and sweet as I am currently writing a new show STARRING which we will perform on the Solstice at Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater in June. Picking up from yesterday’s inner battle between ego and Self, which saw me address some unresolved issues, today’s oracle at Taurus 18° is A Woman Airing An Old Bag Through The Open Window Of Her Room which is an image of purification. And this seems to follow. Because I for one feel very purged a result of holding forth to some folks I felt had acted unkindly. Spring cleaning of the emotional sort. I recommend it. Cleansing the doors of perception. Setting the record straight. Clearing the way for goodness. Life really is to short to suffer fools and to associate oneself with people, places and things that have low or bad energy. That’s all this old bag has to say today.

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That above paragraph was all I posted for the last nine hours of the day. But without italicizing this postscript one of those synchronic things just happened. It’s just after 4PM and a short time ago Stella texted me a picture (below) with the words “Just now! Xxx” to which I replied “Ooooooooo” because, if you know me, and I may already have written about this here—oh, no, my first Blague senior moment—but who cares, you haven’t read all 48 of my blog Blague entries anyway.

When we were writing Sextrology back in the day I went through a “metaphysical visitation” period whereby I was awakened every morning at 3:33 AM. And before this surfaced as a theme in the Nicholas Cage film vehicle Adaptation, being awoken at this time was an experience I owned. I came to realize that 3+3+3 signaled the nine Muses, the triple goddess in triplicate. I automatically see an upward spiral.

Of course the three is also the trident on it’s side, so little wonder that this Sabian symbol is ruled by the sign of PIsces whose ruler Neptune’s symbol is that trident. 48 reduces to 12 which reduces to 3. So it get’s better

When I started the Afterglow Festival I did so under the name 333; but not automatically. There already was a 333 business on the South Shore of Massachusetts. Some kind of management company. They were not easy to reach—I had to put on my Corleone thinking cap—I have always loved the fact that Lynne’s name is Corbett and mine is Leone so together we are Corleone—lion heart—although the Cor in Corbett is actually Gaelic for raven which is the sigil of their house. Mine of course is Bert Lahr.

So I finally tracked these people down and convinced them, can you imagine, to write me a letter “letting” me also be 333, Inc in Massachusetts. Afterglow is a d/b/a/ off of that. I figured I’d need to court these Muses in the making of the festival and surely I need invoke them moving forward with new artistic goals.

The first year of the festival we put it on at The Provincetown Theater which was lovely in its way. We comped a great many people. But when I tallied the total of actual tickets sold over the four days it came to, yes you guessed it, folks, 333.

You have to believe we are magic. LIfe is all just one big upward stroll through the Guggenheim.

The battle is within. That’s the message of Bhagavad-Gita. And today’s Sabian symbol: A Symbolical Battle Between “Swords” And “Torches” for 17° Taurus. It is the eternal war between the ego-will and the higher Self or Soul. You know what your struggle is. Enough said.

The sign of Capricorn would rule today’s oracle in a twelve-fold sequence. And just the first three words of the symbol for 16° Taurus, fits the bill of that sign: An Old Teacher Fails To Interest His Pupils In Traditional Knowledge. Capricorn is ruled by planet Saturn, named for the old, deposed god of the golden age. In our charts, planet Saturn is an old task-master of a teacher, the effects of which many feel in their “Saturn return,” which occurs approximately every 28 years.

Dane Rudhyar focuses on the negative aspect of this image, citing the inadequacy of past knowledge and, though that may be true, I don’t think it’s the knowledge or the teacher’s fault. I’m old enough now to feel a generational difference between my peers and the new millennials who are, in large part fantastic but, to me, have one fatal flaw: a sense of entitlement that sees them wanting to skip steps, prioritizing reward over process. I don’t blame them. They live in a fast-food world of celebrity and internet millionaires—or so they feel they do given their being pummeled incessantly by marketing machinery that has been aimed at selling personalities, as products, to them since they were born.

It’s not easy to sell traditional ideas to those whose heads are focussed only on their futures, no matter how bleak or empty those futures might be (without the valuable knowledge of the past). But Capricorn’s motto is I use pointing to a resource or accumulated experience to draw upon. Experience is gained over old-father Time, a nickname of Saturn’s. I often find myself selling Provincetown as “the birth place of modern American theatre” in fostering support and interest in my beloved Afterglow Festival which is a non-profit endeavor geared toward keeping (ironically) progressive performing arts alive in its spiritual home. And yet, it sometimes seems I can’t even get that notion across to the young performers I work so hard to present. Whereas artists my age express tremendous gratitude, knowing that this is not the Provincetown of the 1960s and 70s and there is no way they can be given a stage in this hypergentrified town of big-ticket entertainment, nowadays, unless someone brings them there on the wings of a non-profit, this is a fact that seems to be lost, even, on younger performers themselves who are all expectation, conditions, caveats and carve-outs. It’s crazy to my increasingly age-addled mind. Not to say they’re not polite about it. Or that part of me doesn’t applaud their acting like huge stars, as-if’ing their way to success, perhaps; but Jiminy Crickets, I wonder: what happened to earning it? I suppose that notion went out with pay phones and record stores. Again, not their fault. at the culture on which they were weened. The want to get their life and they want it now. They also seem less complexed about using whatever necessary means to do so, but that’s another essay.

It’s all very Goodbye Mr. Chips or, rather, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie wherein the student plays assassin even to the elder teacher who is labelled overly progressive. But it will backfire on the student, ultimately; because if the teacher has failed to teach then the students have failed to learn. They have no foundation for their new ideas. No references. Unless of course they’re Capricorns—those children are born old with seemingly encyclopedic knowledge and a voracious auto-didacticism. You know who you are.

Frustration seems intrinsic in this oracle. The teacher is stymied now and the students may be thwarted later. Yesterday we saw the man braving the storm in his silk hat. He knew where he was coming from and had a jaunty sense of where he was going. Today there is the opportunity to know where we are all coming from, as a collective, on any given subject, but our mind is closed and we only want to look toward the future. We don’t want to learn from past successes or failures or to understand the present or indeed ourselves in the context of a continuum. It is foolhardy and naive to my wizened brain. And from my experience, not having a resource of knowledge to draw upon can put one at a great disadvantage. But perhaps it frees ones mind to be filled with new ideas and the impetus to move forward unencumbered by the past.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Midway through Taurus, At 15°, Head Covered With A Rakish Silk Hat, Muffled Against The Cold, A Man Braves A Storm is the Sabian symbol du jour on which to meditate. The word rakish immediately stands out. The tone of this oracle is a bit jaunty, if not somewhat disreputable. The man seems to be a self starter; it is likely that he has braved a storm before. He may be somewhere in the middle on the social spectrum; the prevailing wind isn’t at his back; it might be more of a struggle than he knows, or will even admit. He is braving the storm. He hasn’t accepted a lower lot in life like the porter, but his success isn’t assured. He portrays either naive bravado or great character in heading into the storm. Perhaps the storm is raging inside him and will empower him. This oracle is ruled by Sagittarius in a twelve-fold sequence. The sign is ruled by Jupiter, named for the chief god of thunder and lightning, that may strike, with genius, like wild fire—Sagittarius is the unpredictable mutable-fire sign that inspires the higher mind.

Sagittarius connects the subconscious with the conscious into a stream of consciousness that has often characterized genius expression. The sign is known to breed risk-taking. And this man, with his rakish mindset, shows devil-may-care, daring. He is fueled by outsized confidence which may be more than a match for social heirarchies. He’s a man on the move, and his confidence comes from within, not from outside acceptance or validation. Here, the individual is taking transition into his own hands, moving himself to the next level of human consciousness, social standing and probably both. He is drawing not on privilege but on experience. He’s been there and done that. He possesses street smarts but he’s building upon them; he’s not going to stay where he is, he’s going places. I think of Frank Sinatra, a Sagittarius, or anyone who comes from the city streets but is blessed with high intelligence and talent and he’s determined to put all the pieces together, no denying where he’s coming from, and unapologetic in his desire for success.

When the going gets tough…etc. And some of us know this dynamic well. I’m this man. I come from financially poor beginnings, and my father, who had countless shortcomings, was also this man, and he took us as far into the storm as he could, typically sporting a dapper hat, with a feather, a symbol of higher-mind aspirations. He had the benefit of being middle class when there was one, but still he worked for the man who tried and mostly succeeded to fuck him over in the end. The storm for him was that of social strata and prejudice. He died with nothing except for an uncompromising nature that never let him quit. I seemed to have inherited that. For me the storm is not working for the man. So braving it isn’t a just a necessity it’s a privilege. I welcome the wind and rain on my face.

Then again I had a weird and wonderfully wacky Pisces mother who, again, when in her cups when I was small, insisted I accompany her outside for strolls during hurricanes.

There is something a bit cringy about the costume of the man with the hat. He seems to wear his station in life. He’s a big garish, perhaps, bordering on nouveau. That always makes me uncomfortable. Like Stella Dallas at a fancy estate; or the penchant some men have these days of adopting a sort of neo Oceans Eleven style when asked to dress up for weddings. Barf. I feel some pity for this man in the oracle just as I genuflect to his pluck. He is telegraphing his desire for upward mobility via trappings that might prevent him from it. Again I think of Frank Sinatra who, despite his success, being labelled a wop, as my father surely was, snubbed in the end by those Kennedys who, let’s face it, weren’t exactly bluebloods themselves. But I find prejudice is more prevalent the closer the social proximity between classes. It explains why Italian Americans can be the most prejudice of African Americans. It’s because they were the last immigrant wave before the Civil Rights Movement.

If the storm symbolizes an adverse social climate, I wonder what that means for me. Different things at different times perhaps. Surely there are enclaves closed to me. Although, a jaunty hat connoting a happily tweaked, optimistic mindset, I might not see those obstacles. Sagittarius’ motto, of course is, I see, and as the higher vibration of Gemini, it sees beyond duality, employing a third-eye (blind) tertiary perspective. Our man isn’t this or that. He isn’t his origins, nor is he the embodiment of his aspirations. He is somewhere at the point between, the mark ‘twain—Samuel Clemens is also Sagittarius. So we ask ourselves: Where we are we our transitional selves? Where are we the wo/man on the move? Where are we coming from and where are we going? Are we bravely facing any impeding elements or obstacles along the way? And how does that hone our character?

Sometimes it’s May so suddenly. Things really can start to speed up now as, for many of us, summer looming nigh doesn’t mean decamping to some island in Maine to read a slew of books until Autumn taps you on the shoulder. It’s showtime in more ways than one. This time of year can be a trigger for me because it is truffled with deadlines and I am hardpressed not to get ahead of myself; added to which I experience a surge of f.o.m.o. with so many events and openings and gatherings and ahhhhhhhh. Decades ago, I might have started chain-smoking or overserving myself libations. So I must be supermindful.

The oracle for today at 14° Taurus is: On The Beach, Children Play While Shellfish Grope At The Edge of The Water. And it immediately slows me down. I believe this symbol is addressing human existence on two different levels: On the conscious plane, where we might as yet be (ye) like little children, and on the subconscious one where our selves are connected to some sort of primordial soup, perhaps, of cosmic awareness. In neither instance are we engaged in anything too socially steeped as to be disengaged from nature with cynical, sophisticated or spinning adult minds. We are not window shopping or playing sherpa to posers or sychophants. That which is manifest is, here, is play; and the rest reads as a primaeval source of consciousness, creativity or some such.

So yes, yes yes: I find this imagery quite helpful today. I am engaged in several creative and heady work projects all at once, and my schedule for the next several weeks is packed with marks to hit and stolen moments when I’m meant to move so-called mountains. But what if I were to approach all my scheduled activity as play, letting a good half of my mind float around in the tide of creativity, ebbing and flowing and washing up ideas, here and there, as needed. If the most functional or professional or together I need be is akin to some kid frolicking along a beach who, when out of imaginative notions, might need only run down to the water’s edge to see what life might be floating there, to consider, poke at or capture? Well then that might surely make the month ahead less fraught and more fun and, possibly, just possibly, yield more successful products than a default type-A personality ticking items off myriad to-do lists might achieve. Frankly, I’ve had it up to here with that guy; and I would so very much enjoy just one May without him huffing and puffing and bemoaning the fact “there isn’t enough time.” For what? To be some self-profesying stress case?

I have been very fortunate to spend all but the first six years of my life with a house a stone’s throw from a beach. (And the first six were spent at the Skyline Cabana Club, now on the site of Liberty State Park, in Jersey City and that was a total gas.) But from the age of seven, I spent every summer growing up “down the shore” in Belmar, N.J. where my parents bought a big house with a wrap around porch just a block from the ocean. It was city-ish compared to the beach experience we had out in Wainscott, where Stella and I rented our first beach house, or on Cape Cod where we bought a house in the days before we rented in Provincetown and Wellfleet. The point is I’ve never been able to be very far from the ocean. I don’t think I’d be happy without at least knowing it’s nearby.

As a child, my mother, sister and I spent the entire summer in Belmar and my father visited on weekends. It wasn’t that far away from our permanent home or his work; and now in retrospect I’m sure he was up to a little bit of no good. And my Pisces mother was happiest in her cups without any overlording by him in those days. My sister was hostile and never spoke to me. So really summer meant that I was completely untethered. It was the seventies and eighties and I too got up to a little bit of no good. Tales of my nighttime teenage revelries that included long and winding bike rides to and from Asbury Park in the wee hours would curl your hair, so I’ll skip that bit—I have to leave something shocking for the memoirs—but my collection of daytimes was one long idyll. Even when old enough to legally drink and work as a waiter in restaurants, partying with a pack of preppy, nut-brown, sparkling tooth faces framed with dry, thick surfer, salt-stiff, sun-bleached hair, I might skip going to bed, but doze on the porch in a blanket in a hammock for a couple of hours until the first old man or woman walking a dog at dawn would wake me; at which point I’d grab a towel, zombie-like, and stroll the block to the empty beach to greet the rising Sun which would paint the entire ocean pink as it poked its way above the horizon; and I would slip into the silky rose brine and swim out as far as I dared indulging in the rare private moments one might have in this environment which would, within hours, be blanket to blanket, boombox to boombox, a battle of Coppertone and Hawaiian Tropics and orange Bain de Soleil played out in the breeze.

I would emerge after an hour at least, imagining myself a young Apollo or Dionysus dripping from my rejuvenating bath, and fall to my towel to finish the sleep I started hours before, often awaking to find myself completely surrounded by the throng. And I would tip toe home to no recrimination, pulpy orange juice and Munster cheese lovingly melted by mother on a plain toasted bagel. Even writing this is chilling me.

Whenever asked to imagine my most relaxing experience or directed to go to my happy place, or attempt to get a lower blood pressure reading than I typically do, I always recall the sense-memory of my morning swims in that pink water, the crystalline pre-dawn sky still twinkling with stars. My favorite spot to slip in was along a jetty that created a tiny cove and pool that was spared the large rolling effect of the breakers, even at low tide, if you hugged the line of jagged rock and conglomerate as you pushed out to sea. There would be tiny minnows and starfish and crabs and whatever those barnacley things are called attached to the rocks—barnacles maybe. The unreal colors led me to imagine I was swimming in an ocean on another planet, or in some Yes album landscape come to life.

The summer before going to college I decided not to work a job; I demurred, really, much to my parents “chagrin”, apparently—at least this is what my friend Dick Badenhausen’s mother Margo said my mother told her though she never uttered anything to me. I spent everyday, all day, on the beach, from 8am until 7pm, with quick runs home for food, bathroom breaks and, quite probably, the occasional puff off of something soothing. And I read. I just read. Starting with children’s books. I know this will sound odd or sad but I never read children’s books as a child. My parents never read to me and I didn’t read. Even in grade school I would skim any reading assignment or just not do it at all. Nobody checked my homework. We were not a conscientious family. I remember the first book I read, besides D’Aulaires Greek Mythology and Edith Hamilton’s Mythology, was The Once and Future King which was kind of a doorstop and supposedly too advanced for my ten year old brain. It wasn’t. Though I loved this book it didn’t trigger readership in me and,, by that time, it was too late to go back and read kids books. I had never even heard of The Chronicles of Narnia until my best friend senior year of high school gave me his set to read over the summer after graduation. Which I did all at once, followed by the The Lord of The Rings trilogy and then Salinger’s Nine Stories, Franny and Zooey, and Raise High The Roofbeam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction, plus my university catalog. I was the most tranquil I’d ever been in my life, at seventeen, no longer a child, already possessing dark secrets, while not yet an adult in spite of them.

Even though I’ve been at the beach most of my life, there is nothing like, and no way to recapture, the experience of ones salad days, which for me were very specifically, July and August of that summer. I am so grateful that I had the unwitting forsight not to work that summer. I have something so potent, more than memory, to draw upon, now as a result. And while it’s still early May, today’s oracle reminds me that: no matter what my calendar looks like, I am going to do my absolute damnest to not create unnecessary work or stress for myself, and to channel the feeling of moving through that pink water, as I consciously would, with the smoothest, longest strokes and nary a splash. I’m going to let the Sabian symbol of Taurus, 14° set the tone for the entire summer. In a twelve-fold sequence this forty-forth symbol would fall under the rule of Scorpio which, in contrast to the preceding sign of Libra, eschews the outer world of order and appearances and embraces an inner world, that, of the subconscious. It is the fixed-water sign, concentrated, distilled and crystalized emotion that isn’t expressed but kept guarded and used to power one’s desire, like a dragon protecting its treasure deep in the recesses of the earth. There is no f.o.m.o here or whining or complaining. Scorpio, ruled by Pluto, named for the god of the underworld (subterra and the subconscious), employs the power of elimination, pruning, to inspire growth at the unseen root level of experience. Thus Scorpio and the astrological eighth house are associated with regeneration, sleep, sex and even death, which is only a dreadful name for rebirth.

As a child we are naturally inward focussed; and at seventeen or ability to be so is still rather automatic. As most of us age we lose our capacity for this and have to intercede with meditative practices to reintroduce this element back into our lives. Even in meditation, I employ that pink dawn ocean; so I’m going to return to that source now, in light of all the tap dancing I’m meant to do as fast as I can, and find that fixed-watery place inside myself, the vibrational crystal of my inner being, the insouciant Mona Lisa smile of my salad days and demure, once again, when it comes to work, taking on only that which I can execute as play. I have Mars conjunct Neptune in Scorpio. In simple terms that spells an active imagination, not to mention the ability to cast some pointed spells. Mars is the active self, fighting the good fight; and Neptune is that vast primordial sea of imagination and possibility. And, really, today’s oracle is about working on both levels simultaneously, finding the parrallel between them, returning to simpler joys for revitalization. Running around, like yesterday’s porter, subject to the needs and dictates of others is anathema to the experience of the child taking his cues from his inner life; not to mention remaining connecting to the natural world and its energies.

The message of this oracle is sychronistically the same as the Tarot card I pulled from the deck, as I’m wont to do daily, yesterday and then, curiously, again today, the Page of Pentacles: Connecting with life’s simple pleasures. As Stella and I tell our clients, this may be simple, but it isn’t always easy. We mustn’t attempt at once more than we can achieve via our conscious minds and ego drives. We must keep a toe in that water and skip along the shore. A not so nice voice in my head is saying: Who are you kidding? And the truth is I have already failed to take this oracle on board in the hours spent putting this blog entry together. Living life on life’s terms can be a challenge. But we must live and let live and allow that which isn’t working to fall away, as no amount of struggle or speeding your way through a schedule like a pin ball bouncing off walls and obstacles will serve you in the end. I’ve never said it before but today it seems highly appropriate: Peace Out.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

I’ve been actually waiting for an opportunity to revisit the Taurus 4° oracle of April 23, The Pot Of Gold At The End of The Rainbow as the symbol sort of set me off on a negative spin. And today feels like that opportunity with Taurus 13° A Porter Carrying Heavy Baggage. So go take a look see at the April 23 entry entitled Roy G. Biv to which I’ve added an italicized postscript that more fully explores the positive significance of that oracle. Life being paradoxical, that oracle was distinguished in my blog as being a real thorn in my side, which stuck this whole time, until I came to accept and realize how not “trite” but truly transcendent and powerful that symbol is, probably more than any upon which I’ve yet mused. But first let’s look at today’s 13° Taurus symbol which triggered my need to go back 9°, to Taurus 4°:

Yesterday, we saw a man and woman window shopping. The female polarity of that image symbolizes our ability to look inward, whist the male is the objective, outward energy, taken together. Heavy baggage is never good, whether it’s an image of servitude, debt or emotional weight. I’m guessing here that it’s all a combo platter. Maybe the man yesterday went on a spending spree after we last saw him “just looking,” or maybe he remained with his nose pressed against the glass unable to purchase anything. Either way we are being made aware, again, of the haves and the have nots. The porter isn’t carrying his own baggage after all, he is burdened by the weight of inequity, something the sign of Libra, which governs this oracle in a twelve-fold sequence, knows a little bit about and doesn’t much appreciate. Libra, with its motto, We are seeks harmony and union and balance and order and equality, especially on the social level, air signs pointing to the mental and social experience. The porter, in his position, can be the personification of the perception of lack if not dearth itself. Then again, he might be happily in service, filling a societal need, doing whatever is necessary to gain a financial or societal foothold.

I think of films of the 1920s and 30s. Some put upon bug-eyed porter double-taking to the camera, commentating on the comings and goings of the privileged, exposing the villain, playing pal to the hero. He is something of a reality check and the conscience of the drama, pointing to the excess and absurdity that surrounds him. One cannot discount the most famous porter scene of all, from Macbeth. It immediately follows Duncan’s murder and provides comic relief while it allows the actor playing Macbeth time to wash the blood from his hands. The porter, along with all the residents of the castle has been on a drunk into the wee hours of the morning. He is roused by a knocking at the gate. In self-amusement, he pretends he is the gatekeeper to Hell, which has some truth in it given the bloody activities that have been transpiring. A connection is being drawn between Inverness and The Inferno of Dante. The porter hears what is MacDuff now repeatedly knocking at the gate and plays a little concocted scene in is mind whereby he, as hell’s gatekeeper, muses on what brand of sinner he might be letting into his make-believe abyss. One such character he imagines might have come a-knocking is an equivocator or con-man. The porter playacts:

Knock, knock! Who’s there, in th’ other devil’s name? Faith, here’s an equivocator that could swear in both the scales against either scale, who committed treason enough for God’s sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven. O, come in, equivocator.

The mention of the scales is not lost on me given Libra’s assignation over this oracle. The con-man can lie under oath, in court, but he cannot lie to God in heaven, so he is bid welcome to perdition, with a chuckle. The porter in our oracle might likewise be providing us comic relief, reciting a similar monologue in his head about those whose heavy bags he’s carrying. Not only might it be easier for a camel to be thread through a needle than it is for the rich wo/man to gain entrance to heaven: being rich and more subject to greed might actually put you on a fast-track to hell. And that porter may prefer to show others the way, carting their karmic Vuitton, than to be ushered in that direction himself. There but for the grace…he might be learning a great deal about the haves, enough to know he’s happy not to be one of them. He may have humble needs which are more than fulfilled by his salary and tips. The baggage isn’t his own. He can leave it at the station whilst others must continue arranging to have it hauled about. They certainly can’t take it with them on their ultimate destination which might very well be damnation.

Those who cannot carry their own heavy weight might well have too much. And yet, as we see in Macbeth, enough isn’t enough for some people. There are those who despite their lush lot in life still plot and scheme to eliminate others in their path toward some expanded worldly dominion, only to find themselves on a runaway train, hastening their own demise. This is the opposite of the illuminated rainbow path with its blessed weighty residuals, having been sent ahead, waiting on the other side.

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If yesterday was about appreciating the natural world and what we already have to make our garden grow, Mary, then today is about casting our gaze outward with some longing for that which we might desire from what society has on offer. A Young Couple Window-Shopping is the Sabian Symbol for 12° Taurus, which, in a twelve-fold sequence, would be lorded over by the sign of Virgo. This makes immediate sense to me: The Virgo, who is apparently not gluten-free, holds a sheaf of seeded grain which she is about to consume, and the natural intelligence of her body will separate wheat from chaff, nutrient from detritus. If we read the sheaf as a phallic symbol, this might be an image of would-be gestation not digestion, but, still, the natural intelligence of the human body will take its course. Either way, the Virgin considers what she takes in and its effects on her. Today’s oracle reads similarly, the couple is considering what’s on offer in store windows in anticipation of consuming the bounty society, not nature, has on offer.

When it comes to natural appetites in the form of hunger or some surging in our loins, it needn’t involve our mind, though it should in light of making the right choices in what to eat or who to pork. When it comes to societal stores of bounty, we must employ our mind and ego more actively. Discernment isn’t just a filter, it is the means by which we digest our experience and decide what is need and what is want. We should give ourselves the requisite props for operating in society. If you’re a musician, you should shop for the right instrument; if you’re a high-powered sales executive, you need to look your best and possess some efficient gadgetry. Materials can take the form of needs if they are in service to true self-expression and efficacy. Virgo is the sign of service and of work. And you better work and serve your own realness. Discernment however is more difficult to employ on the societal level as, unless you’re given to gluttony or excessive lust, our natural appetites have inherent shut-off valves. But how do we know when enough is enough when we enter the man-made agora, the market place, and how do we know what is too little. Perhaps the couple is window shopping because they cannot afford to buy anything. Surely, this image carries the connotation of feeling cut off from the bounties civilization might provide, feeling like one with his or her nose pressed up against the window, with no easy access or entreé.

Personally I don’t like how I feel when I over consume on goods. I can get as nauseous buying things I don’t need as I do overeating or indulging in sweets. But it can be a good barometer. It might see me embrace a more ascetic lifestyle for quite awhile; just as it inspires me to take stock of what I do have and to appreciate what that is all the more. With our clients we work very mindfully on the power of appreciation and foster a sort of alchemy that can positively take hold  when they embody that power in their own lives. Also, think of that Beltane image of yesterday—A Woman Watering Flowers in Her Garden—and its interpretation as Mother Earth, the natural intelligence of the world, taking care of all life, her own vast organism, of which we are just a part; now think of the couple, man and woman, polarities pointing to the proliferation of life, on a stroll out window shopping: They are in a position of power to purchase that which might work or not with Mother Nature in her design. Adam and Eve have been set loose from her Garden and their actions might further alienate them from it or they might contribute to their getting back to it. In our society it’s all to easily to foster this separation between nature and the human self; though we can always stop, that window symbolizing both a momentary pause and perhaps some self-reflection on that score. The virgin of Virgo bids us consider what consumption or consumerism will do to our individual organism and the larger one of our world, as they are one and the same.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The notion of we humans being organs of consciousness via which the world, or indeed the universe, might perceive itself is not only an intriguing one, but it’s somehow reassuring in its sense of connectedness and literal responsibility. Virgo rules digestion. And I think we can trust our guts to know whether our consumerist actions will entail the making of too large a footprint. We are window shopping, just looking. Our eyes are the first line of defense against glut or waste. Let us try imagining our gaze is not just our own. Let us be the eyes of the world.

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