Libra 20° (October 12)

One more day of denial and sloth and then it all has to come together. I watched this incredible documentary on the wilderness of Romania and two terrible movies. I am teetering a bit on the edge of insufficiency and now I must pivot into total commitment. I suppose I’m playing chicken with myself a bit because I only want to work non-stop for the shortest amount of time. And so between now and February isn’t so long a stretch to get through round one. Speaking of chicken, yesterday the crap oven in this house couldn’t quite handle my recipe where I cook at high temperature. All the alarms went off and, who knew, the alarm includes a male voice telling us to evacuate. It was pretty intense. The chicken is for tomorrow as I made a kale and potato soup based on the Portuguese recipe. We managed to have one more semi-celebratory night and I went to bed feeling sated and physically very tired.

The following blocks of text are exceprts from my first year of  Blagues, nos. 976-980. I am reading through all of my Blagues, five per day, and posting some samples here. Now, in my sixth year of writing this Blague, by the time I get to my seventh, I will have journeyed through all the daily Blagues of my first five years. If that’s confusing I apologize. Year seven, I’ll only have to read through year six, once a day.

The sign of Cancer is ruled by Mother Moon and it governs the fourth astrological house of, among other things, the female population. Cancer embraces a world view, that of existence, as female, a mother source needing our protection. It is distinguished as the cardinal (initiative) water sign of the zodiac—think of a literal bubbling spring or source of a river. Cancer women, by their nature, embody this energy, being fountains of feeling. Cancer men, meanwhile, tend to work on the emotions of others, especially women, to whom the male Moonchild appeals on the level of being the kind of guy a girl or fellow can take home to mother: A clean, well-scrubbed, if not eternally collegiate candidate for a reproductive and/or romantic partnership. Cancer Man doesn’t fancy himself the king that Leo does; he prefers to play a comfier, seemingly sidelong role akin to that of prince consort to some loving force-of-nature on whose emotional support he is kept aloft, swept-along, navigating his way toward a life of shared success. Cancerian Earnest Hemingway’s Jake Barnes is drawn in by the stronger female force of of Brett Ashley. It’s the same in same-sex relationships. Cancer man demurs in day-to-day decision making, only sweating the big stuff, letting a more domineering, but no less type-A, loved one feel s/he’s running the whole show, but it’s not always so. Faster than Kevin Bacon can drop his wife’s name into a sentence, Cancer guy will sidle in sideways, just like a crab, and assert his agenda, taking hold of situations with a vice-like tenacity you never saw coming. For your consideration: A list of uncalloused Cancer men who have mutually benefitted from having their oft sappy chick-flick selves appeal to a predominantly female, not to mention a more dominant-male, population: Tom Hanks, John Cusack, Harrison Ford, Tobey Maguire, Tom Cruise, Patrick Wilson, Daniel Radcliffe, Milo Ventimiglia, Benedict Cumberpatch, Topher Grace, Vin Diesel, David Hasselhoff, Robin Williams, Chris O’Donnell, Burt Ward, Chris Isaaks, Billy Crudup, Chace Crawford, Kevin Bacon, Josh Hartnett, George Michael, Justin Chambers, Michael Phelps, James Brolin, Jimmy Smits, Kris Kristofferson, Prince William.

Cancer men seem to foster support from the general populous, striking a chord and becoming synonymous with their field of interest. Orville Redenbocher. Richard Branson. Jesse Ventura. Michael Flatley. It’s amazing what some of these guys can be famous for. As, quicker than you can say David Hasselhoff, the sign of Cancer has a way of breeding those who capture public imagination and make bank on it Many a Cancerian man distinguishes himself as a single name who defines a whole area of expression—Hemingway, Rembrandt, Bullfinch. Forbes. And why? Because Cancerian men are narrowly focused on their field with a wide stance in their appeal. And as a bit of a side note: Whether or not you actually believe we went to the Moon, the fact remains that Cancer men often do end up looking a lot like the Man in it. You decide whether or not he might also be described as cheesy. Behold the bald and the beautiful Cancerian males who glow with a kindly condescension, a subtle superiority and a distant devotion. And beware the chrome-dome glare: Patrick Stewart, John Glenn, Yul Brynner, Jeffrey Tambor, Terrence Stamp, Larry David, Jesse Ventura, Montel Williams, Anthony Edwards, Donald Faison, Michael Jace, Vin Diesel, Gerald Ford, Kurtwood Smith, Forest Whitaker, Mel Brooks, Danny Glover, Mike Tyson, Zinedine Zidane, Dalai Lama, Anthony Edwards, Jackie Earle Haley, Dan Aykroyd, David Drake, Prince William and all the future folically challenged Canerian fellows.

Moonchild man lives in a private word, both real and imaginary, avoiding conflict or sometimes, even, anything more than vague interaction, at all costs. In the literal sense, he prefers solo work, which he can perform, set apart, ebbing and flowing to his own rhythm; and, figuratively, too, he must let his mind drift to imaginings of would-be scenarios he might ultimately realize. He appears the personification of hope and promise needing naught but cultivation to draw him out. Meanwhile, he accesses others sensitivity, appealing to their feelings as well as their funny bones, sensitivity and humor being hallmarks of his charm. One feels safe in the company of the Cancerian, that on this journey through life, he is happy to be a designated driver. He is so unassuming, or so it seems. The truth is he is one of the more deliberate and calculated characters on the astrological block, though rarely in an insidious sort of way. He simply believes in the fulfillment of his potential and he will get his hooks into situations, and people too, whom he considers to play a part in the unfolding of his destiny.

=====================

Cancer woman’s life journey can be characterized as one long transition from the seeming chaos of her youth toward achievement of her own natural rhythm. Long before Linda Ronstadt marched to the beat of a different drum, Cancer girls have often felt emotionally abandoned at a tender age, echoed in some form of their own self-abandon. It takes time’s ticking tides to emotionally process Cancer woman’s way to a calmer shore—flood myths are endemic to the cosmic energy of the sign. Instinct defines the Cancerian realm, and the lady Moonchild, in particular, develops a gut variety by way of fully embracing any rocky circumstance of her youth; the inevitable embarkation therefrom; any subsequent feelings of being “at sea” along with strong senses of hope and promise; before she can ultimately experience deliverance. Cancer and the Moon rule the 4th astrological house of both the home one comes from and the home one creates for oneself. It is the house of re-creation, which is why one should never give up hope that a Cancer woman will land herself a happy, healthy and emotionally secure existence. In the meantime, it can be quite a shite show. When Neil Young warbled “she’s like a hurricane” one might place bets he had an emotionally loaded Cancerian woman in mind. Jennifer Saunders (Edina Monsoon!), Lindsay Lohan, Carly Simon, Pamela Anderson, Ludivine Sagnier, Courtney Love, Busy Phillips, Sue Lyon, Cyndi Lauper, Penny Arcade, Julianne Hough, Sofia Vergara, Phoebe Legere, Gisele Bündchen, Karen Black, Jerry Hall, Jessica Simpson, Kelly McGillis, Monica Lewinsky, Princess Diana, Imelda Marcos, Leona Helmsley, Lizzy Borden and Helen Keller are all Cancerians who, at some point or other, might have been a bit upset and needed to lie down.

Cry us a river: It can be near comical to peruse a photo collage of Cancer women, as, more often than not, their expression suggests they might be on the verge of tears. Cancer females embody the cardinal-water assignation of their sign. They are fountains of feeling ruled by Mother Moon which, we know, controls the tides. These daughters of Phoebe and Selene are indeed one with their feels, which can make them wildly chaotic or oh-so touchingly histrionic. Little wonder they make the most emotionally accessible actresses. We cite the character of Cinderella as one of the Cancer woman archetypes. Like Cindy, Cancer lady is equal parts lamenting and hopeful, mirroring the expressions of the waxing and waning Moon. Indeed, she employs the power of wish-craft, floating her hopes toward the deliverance of desired results. The Cinderella myth is filled with nocturnal imagery—moon-powered elements—from pumpkins, which grow by night, and mice and rats, which are nocturnal. The woeful beauty of the Cancer woman can be captivating, inviting salvation, if not some savior prince/ss to trot up on a white charger or in a convertible white Cooper Mini. A list of pouty Cancer princesses includes Liv Tyler, Eva Green, Juno Temple, Shelley Duvall, Deborah Harry, Frances McDormand, Linda Cardellini, Kristen Bell, Diane Kruger, Clair Forlani, Phoebe Cates, Isabelle Adjani, Elizabeth McGovern, Meryl Streep, Princess Diana, Sandra Oh, Judy Greer, Melissa Rauch, Edie Falco, Stephanie Seymour, Selena Gomez, Linda Ronstadt, Ginger Rogers, Eva Marie Saint, Diana Rigg, Janet Leigh, Olivia De Havilland. Boo hoo.

Cancer woman is the embodiment of longing, the true nature of which provides insight into her personality. Think of longing as emotional outreach, an active and useful mechanism for scanning and searching life, the universe, all experience, for that for which one has true feeling. In this way, Cancer woman perpetually takes emotional action. She invented the term: putting out feelers. And we feel her, don’t we. Cancer women on the whole are not subtle creatures who hide their needs, indeed, their demands.

Think of her symbol crab. She flows with the current, which is to say the present, which does sometimes require being what might appear to be clingy. The fact is she must establish fixed experience for herself to counterbalance what is otherwise a life of being swept up in the moment, allowing herself to be fully accessible, circumstantially and emotionally. Accessing feeling is a hallmark of the Cancerian female, most poignantly expressed by the brand of actresses born under the sign.

==========================

In our book Sextrology, the Leo Man chapter is titled The Natural. So many tawny men of the sign are wont to go native, being astrologically designed, like their totem Lion, to easefully roam the great expanses of the planet. They are attracted to cultures and peoples with a primal throb. The lion is born free and stays that way. Like its ruler, the central Sun, the heart-center of the body is governed by the sign of Leo. The beating of the heart is the rhythm of life; and besides boasting many drummers among its number, the sign of Leo breeds men who live life at its own pace or, at least, they believe that they do. For, the zodiac’s king might naturally confuse his own will with that of the divine. He assumes he’s Right. The shadow side of the king, of course, is the tyrant and anyone acquainted with a Leo man has probably seen it creep in. The golden Leo nature boy abhors artifice and is near maniacal in his embracing of authenticity. He is, by nature, skeptical of phonies or over-sophisticates. Whether he possesses the rugged outdoorsyness of Davy Crockett, the pastoral, bare aesthetic of Thomas Eakins, the natural sweepingness of filmmaker John Huston, the arid no-nonsense of Sundance king Robert Redford, the hempish ways of Woody Harrelson, the prairie rattyness of Garrison Keillor, the vegan crunch of Casey Affleck or the going-nativeness of William Clark, Herman Melville, Cartier-Bresson, Lawrence of Arabia or even Ginger Baker, for that matter, Leo men celebrate the beating of creation’s heart and extol our earthly kingdom and mankind in its most noble natural, state. Some other Leo hunks include the “Conans” Jason Momoa and Arnold Schwarzenegger, “Thor” Chris Hemsworth, “Hulk” Eric Bana, and “Avatar” Sam Worthington.

Just the previous sign of Cancer is ruled by the mother-principled Moon, which portrays creation as a nurturing goddess-source from whom all matter springs (cardinal water), august Leo, ruled by the father-principled Sun, sees creation from the view of a distant, fiery sky god (fixed fire) to be revered, if not feared. Leo rules the 5th astrological house, that of co-creation with god, the mantle of which Leo man, the zodiac’s own lion king, willingly dons, embodying entitlement, if not divine right. Let’s just say he assumes authority easily, as author, akin to Arthur, boy-king, like David, taking the central role. The Sun symbol is a dot inside a circle—think Arthur seated center at table. The lion is king… of beasts; David slays Goliath, read: his own giant beastly nature, just as Arthur subdues and civilized the pagan wilds, inside himself. Leo man can be a hot head. There we said it. Little wonder that the shadow side of the sign has spawned those having such dictatorial sway: Napoleon, Mussolini, Castro. But seriously, think of the many tyrannical film directors and kings of that industry, those who will make or break others’ careers: Hitchcock (go ask Tippi), Demille, Kubrick (go ask Shelley), David O. Russell (go ask Lily). Huston, Redford, Cameron, Polanski, Penn, M. Night Shayamalan, Kevin Smith. And then there are Leo actors who play god-complexed egoists with a vengeance: Robert Deniro, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Matt LeBlanc, Andrew Garfield—probably also that ginger cat, Garfield—Kevin Spacey, Billy Bob Thornton, Wesley Snipes, David Duchovny, Adam Samberg, Laurence Fishburn, Sam Elliot, Jean Reno, Kevin McKidd, Jeremy Piven and Steve Martin.

==============================

Artemis, the goddess of the hunt, whom Homer called a “lioness amongst women” is the premier archetype of the Leo woman, one that resonates through mythology, literature and in flesh- and-blood females of the sign. Artemis is goddess of wild creatures; and Leo women are, in some regard, feral females, on the loose, often latch-key children, if not parentless, at an early age. The aptly named Kit (Katharine) in Taming of the Shrew speaks to the heterosexual Leo woman, anyway, seeking to be trumped, domesticated, by the rare man that she doesn’t outshine—the Sun is her ruler. Cue Leo lady Annie Oakley’s refrain to her would-be love in Annie Get Your Gun: “Anything you can do I can do better.” Indeed, Leo women best the best men at their own games. They’re on the hunt for a man who’s tougher, more wild and passionate than they, playing cat and mouse with weaker male specimens. But let’s not bring J. Lo’s Marc Antony into this. Although Cleopatra, with her own Marc Antony, was a living Leo archetype—Cleo just so happens to be a cliché name for a cat. Catherine in Wuthering Heights is another emanation of the feral Leo, whose cosmic soul mate was the wild Heathcliff. No wonder Leo Kate Bush relates to and sings as that character, just as she appears as Artemis on the cover of her record, Hounds of Love. It’s a whisker’s breath from Kate to Tori Amos. And we can name queen Leo superstars all day long, from Lucille Ball (read: ball of light, like the Sun) to Madonna to Julia Child to J.K. Rowling to Coco Chanel to Martha Stewart to Amelia Earhart to Mae West to Jackie O, not to mention such luscious—and they look like lionesses!—Leo ladies like Charlize Theron, Iman, Jennifer Lawrence, Amy Adams, Honor Blackman, Natasha Hensridge, Vivica Fox and, of course, the classic catwomen Halle Berry and Julie Newmar.

Leo woman draws on a secondary, complementary archetype to Artemis (Roman: Diana), which is that of the Goddess of the Hearth, Hestia (Roman:Vesta). The sign of Leo rules the heart; and the Sun, the heart and hearth of the solar system, rules it. Though Leo women can be most predatory in channeling that huntress energy, particularly in public life, fairly stalking their successes;, in private, they take firm hold of the center around which others draw or revolve. What paradoxically connects the seemingly opposite Artemis and Hestia is that they are both protectors—of the wild and of domestic life, respectively. As that “lioness amongst women,” we see in the Leo lion a dual nature of ferocity and maternal affection. Indeed, real lions are matriarchal, females of the species being the prime movers of their prides. And it’s the same with the human variety: Leo men are typically laid back, lovers of lolling about, while Leo women are fiercely energetic self-starters with often gappy toothed, predators’ smiles. Some savage Leo sweethearts include: Anna Paquin, Elizabeth Moss, Madonna, Gillian Anderson, Rose Byrne, Vera Farmiga, Amy Adams, Mila Kunis, Jennifer Lawrence, Sandra Bullock, Kate Beckinsale, Kristin Wiig, Iman, Jaqueline Kennedy Onassis, Selena Gomez, Jennifer Lopez, Lynda Carter, Louise Fletcher, Helen Mirren, Elizabeth Berkley, Taylor Schilling, Yvonne Strahovski.

The sign of the Lioness boasts any number of disarmingly, flakey, kooky, wiggy, ditzy feline females who are really anything but. For Leo woman plays cat and mouse to outmaneuver the rest of us at every turn. The zodiac’s Queen of Hearts has all the right moves on this chessboard of life, and sometimes letting you think she’s a little out to lunch works something like an ambush. Leo ladies of the stage and screen are often typecast in this very role. Think of Gracie Allen, Lucille Ball, Lisa Kudrow, Victoria Jackson, Sally Struthers, Barbara Eden, Madonna, Mila Kunis, Loni Anderson, Melanie Griffith, Elizabeth Berkley, Christine Taylor, Kristin Chenoweth, Connie Stevens, Rosanna Arquette, Debra Messing, Shelly Winters, Jill St. John, Georgia Engel, Alice Ghostley.

======================================

The move from Leo to Virgo is like a shift in historical consciousness from the divine right of kings to the empowerment of serfs. Virgo’s motto is I serve. In the annals, we saw the absolute power of (Leo) nobility give way to that of the indentured (Virgo), Pride being trumped by Humility—this is mirrored in the rise of allegorical pieces of literature like Everyman, which tackled the dichotomy of virtue and vice, and Dr. Faustus, caught in that same balance between good and evil. The temporal takeaway is that power shifts from crowns to individual human conscience. Take that monarchists. As personifications of these signs, Leo man embodies the golden-boy Sun-king archetype, while Virgo man is a walking-talking morality play, munching on experience and humble pie, embodying that human conscience, whose nature it is to grapple; but, in so doing, to eradicate pride along with every other human vice, digesting experience to extract its every virtue. You won’t see a Virgo man bound into a room unapologetically. He doesn’t have that golden glow of Leo. The sign color of Virgo is silvery grey (Gandalf grey) the result of negotiating a world that can be so black-and-white. He is thoughtful, to a fault, self-effacing, self-examining and often hyper critical. He negotiates his way in the world carefully, and yes, skeptically, but he thereby aims to leave it a better place than he found it. Virgo begins on August 23rd, the festival of Vulcanalia. Vulcan (Greek: Hephaestus, from whose name Faustus might derive) was a disenfranchised “lame” god who channeled the lemons he was given into making lemonade. A smith, a potter, a tinker, an inventor, artisan, artist and, like Faust, an alchemist in all respects. Hephaestus hid himself away, something of a hermit (with that Gandalf wardrobe). Virgo is traditionally ruled by planet Mercury (Greek: Hermes, from whence the term derives)—focus on the work and service at hand, typically making tools and weaponry that would empower the other gods. He forged Zeus’s lightning bolts, for instance, the true power behind the throne. Virgo man, the zodiac’s is likewise a lover of privacy, a symptom, first, of feeling dejected on some level, but ultimately the crucible via which he forges his own path toward success and fulfillment. He will wrestle with his conscience, the true philosopher’s stone, to alchemically transmute his disappointments into opportunities, his wounds into sources of healing and his accumulated woes, source- material, into masterful works of art. Behold the Virgo Everyman of conscience who has sought his separate peace and serenity in his solitude; or as an actor (our best living archetypes!) plays that part to the hilt: Bill Murray, Jimmy Fallon, Luke Wilson, Martin Freeman, Jack Black, Chris Pine, Rupert Grint, Colin Firth, Leonard Cohen, Josh Charles, Armie Hammer, Jason Sudeikis, Adam Sandler, Stephen Fry, Roald Dahl, Louis C.K., Idris Elba, Keanu Reeves, Warren Buffet, Aaron Paul, Alexander Skarsgärd, Richard Gere, Wes Bentley, Oliver Stone, Stephen King, David Copperfield, Moby, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, John Locke, John Cage.

Virgo’s planetary ruler is in dispute. It’s traditional planet is Mercury, which also governs the mutable-air sign of Gemini, the god Mercury (Greek: Hermes) being patron of all sorts of street folk from merchants to thieves, jugglers to magicians, which brings us to the mutable-earth (read: clay) sign of Virgo where it rules alchemists and all the “hermetic” and healing arts. Mercury’s staff, called the Caduceus, is the emblem of the medical profession to this day. Virgo and the 6th astrological house are associated with health, habits and hygiene. But there are those who don’t believe that Mercury actually rules Virgo. Some feel that rulership belongs to Chiron, a minor planet-ette orbiting the Sun between Saturn and Uranus. The notion is that Chiron, discovered in 1977, was once a major planet that got pummeled by asteroids. It thus draws on the archetype of the “wounded healer” in mythology. Chiron was a centaur who wasn’t savage like his fellows, but the opposite, a savior, and he is the father of doctors which were one and the same as magicians, under the grand heading of alchemists. Another theory is that Virgo is ruled by the as yet undiscovered planet Vulcan, which is debatably orbiting between Mercury and the Sun.. Virgo men are menschs but they do tinker—if not nipping and tucking themselves, they may Svengali others, women especially, whom they treat as Pandoras, the first sex doll molded by Hephaestus out of clay. Voila: Alchemical some more Virgo men-schs: Hugh Grant, Elvis Costello, Chris Tucker, Peter Sellers, Tommy Lee Jones, Paolo Coelho, Peter Falk, Bob Newhart, Ben Falcone, Daniel Stern, Adam Sandler, Sam Neill, David Arquette, Mark Harmon, and those who couldn’t leave themselves, let alone others, well, alone: Mickey Rourke, Michael Keaton, Barry Gibb, Billy Ray Cyrus, Eddie Fisher, Michael Jackson, Gene Simmons, Kenny Rogers, Steve Guttenberg, Harry Connick, Jr., Paul Reubens.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree point of the Sabian Symbol may at times be one degree higher than the one listed here. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365/6 days per year—so they nearly, but not exactly, correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go! Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2020 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox.