Libra 5° (September 27)

A bit of an extinction burst today last-minute trip for some quality reds. Did a whole lot of catching up today, and dreaming and scheming. G’s birthday so I sent her a little message. The breaking news is good let’s hope it makes a humungous impact, and that the threats of more information coming are real, for real. Learned that my great acting teacher has moved to the Actor’s Home in Englewood—he soon turns 96 and is still acting from his wheel chair. I will send him a little birthday present; I hope he lives to be 106. I made a glorious clam chowder for dinner after a so-so attempt at egg drop soup for lunch. I have been keeping all our menus in a file since returning from France to which I cannot wait to once again escape. I am letting it all go, letting it all go. I will end up writing a great deal today, many notes on the television show. Suddenly I’d love Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara to play us. I don’t think it’s out of the realm of possibility. There are other choices. I’ve also made some pretty killer notes on the wiki front. It will be a giant presence in the end and I’m determined to just do a bit at a time. Anywig, that’s all for today folks. Remember the whole point of my pasting in past Blagues below is to free myself to write the book I’m currently working on. I will do some affirmations tomorrow for my birthday methinks.

The following blocks of text are exceprts from my first year of  Blagues, nos. 901-905. 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.

Book writing and book business are both bane and boon. But, in this day and age, if you keep your expectations low, you can eek out some kind of living selling e-books under ones own steam, without even much trying. And if you’re lucking enough to have even a small following you can surely beef things up with promotion, advertising and clever ways to amass an audience.

I’m going to say I wrote the forgoing in early October. The subject actually was, in the previous posting, books. So I think I wanted to go somewhere different with this instead of sounding like a how-to manual to self publishing. Good grief. No wonder I stopped writing.

As those who’ve had success with print-published works from good publishing houses, I count myself lucky to say so and I hope to boast the same again some day soon, but the truth is we needed a break from traditional publishing. To test the waters ourselves with a Sextrology ebook then the H.A. books. Those two commodities alone are appealing and sell relatively well without any help from us. Because, truth be told, we not only backed off publishing but also from any self-promotion whatsoever, keeping a low profile and focusing on our private consultancy and clientele. And in so doing, the natural desire to write in us has again risen up. Writing the H.A. books is a great joy. And now I am turning my head to other ebook projects whilst I research for a hopefully next big one in print. I would actually like to serve as a conduit for rare and out-of-print books that fall under a larger umbrealla of esotericsm.

I know at this point that I need to be more interactive with audience, both in the flesh, starting with friends and intimates, to the far-flung reaches of the modest fame that we enjoy in bold-faced desire to beef up said audience, yes, but really to enjoy as part of the creative process. Otherwise, we wouldn’t do any of this. We must let the work pay off creatively first and financially second. There is no getting through. All must be savored, squeezed for all appreciation. Said the life experts. So there is an impetus to make this ever the more real, to be ever the more genuine examples of right living. Which makes one realize how far, and in which ways, one is from that objective.

Still, everything about what I do is appealing to me. I have always been crazy for metaphysics and enlightened beings and mystics and magi of all kinds. I’ve been a ridiculous myth-lete since aged ten when I sew curtains into ceremonial robes and incantated to Dionysus. Now I sometimes stay in a stateroom named for the god, whom I portrayed, quite convivially, in a murder mystery no less. You can’t make it up. And that’s the point—we get glimpses of grace because, well, that’s all we can probably handle, but more to the point: Grace is infinite, by nature. It belongs to the sign of the Water Bearer, that ruled by Uranus named for the god of the infinite Universe.

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The thing people probably know least about us is that we’ve had an extensive background in many facets of fashion and design. People think of us as writers full-stop but it isn’t the full story by a long-shot.

Fresh out of college we moved (back) to Paris, having met on a junior year abroad two years prior. We worked, respectively, as a stylist’s assistant and an editorial assistant at giant, glossy, eighties magazines based there, infiltrating big fashion shows and otherwise dancing on tables or with slinky, asymetrically bare-breasted revelers at clubs.

Two years later in New York City, where we have always, in some manner, though oft infrequently, remained, we were an a respective junior buyer at Bergdorf Goodman and an assistant editor at Avenue magazine. Soon we respectively became a designer at a hot, new sportswear company and a magazine editor, fashion and entertainment writer. (Both also actors). Then we respectively became a consultant for top-name designers and a fashion-TV producer, top-newspsper and glossy magazine feature writer. (Writing horoscope features and columns, ultimately, under our current moniker.) We did fashion and celebrity PR; we wrote ad copy for design magazines. On the strength of our bylines, we were regular “fashion expert” contributors to top in-store magazines with caché.

Though we already had a book deal for Sextrology, it didn’t stop us from taking the tandem/shared job, each of us given the title Executive Editor, at Wallpaper magazine in London. We continued playing fashion experts when asked, while the esoteric brand took off. We had a design clause worked into our book contract such that we could steer the design of the cover and inside art work. All was done to our very precise specifications.

We found we had a burning desire to translate our work with symbols and imagery into an elegant high-end line of jewelry. We barely put the word out there when we had partners and made a giant splash with our original collection. Ten years later we are doing it on our own steam which has brought such joy to my life. Having something tangible to play with again feels so necessary, and it is a fulfilling means via which to channel aesthetic creativity so very akin to our writing and consultancy work.

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We were recntly asked a series of six questions by an author with a webiste about other authors. I thought I’d share some of those thoughts here with you (in fact I’m writing the responses here so they can double as my next nine Blagues.

Here is question one:

People have reactions across the spectrum to their astrological sign, from fascination to disbelief. But everyone is interested in sex. You’ve combined a knowledge of the zodiac with a curiosity as to behavioural patterns. That seems to come from an understanding of people.

We like to watch. Seriously, our shared interest and ultimate immersion in astrology all began with observation. Beginning in our student days, we noticed that men and women of the same sign were, often, very, different from each other. Such that, as an expression of our own brand of humanistic astrology, we consider the Zodiac to have twenty-four gender signs. Still, unlike work with priviate individual clients, successfully writing on the subject of general sun-sign astrology requires exposing specific elements of truth about each of the signs. Over decades of observation we have discerned twenty-four distinct archetypes, under which we all in turn fall, and wherein we share, with other fellows of our sign, more than meets the eye. Obvious traits in appearance and beheavior unite folks under the aegis of their sign; while there are deeper, more metaphysical motivators at play. You can’t escape your archetype, we say, and we credit the symbolically Zodiac with offering infinite insights into we the people born under them. And our archetypes don’t get checked at the bedroom door: Sex and sexuality are important elements of personhood and so, in our philosophy, our signs likewise determine our intimate predispositions and proclivities.

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And even more a knowledge of archetypes. Sextrology, your exceptional bestseller, is far more than A-goes-with-B-but-leave-C-well-alone. It is erudite, witty and draws on a range of concepts, examples, mythology, symbols and well-known icons. It feels full of stories?

We conceived Sextrology to function on a number of levels simultaneously. The Sex- in the title was meant to signify gender first and sexuality second.. We definitely wanted to get our original starry philosophy out there, and really build an argument. But we wanted to temper the more academic suppositions with a supple, straightfoward style. It isn’t your granny’s astrology. We like to think we read like lively, heady dinner party conversation, at turns serious and sophticated and funny, comparative in sociology, religion and literature, weaving myths and fairy tales and pop references into something approaching seamless. We want to tickle funny bones as well as challenge minds on the subject. Not to mention have a little stylistic fun with the erotic bits.

We are all all full of stories. And, for some reason we can’t fully understandthe those born under the same sign do share a similar plot. Be it real, metaphorical or metaphysical. As we continue to trace the myths and legends of multiple archetypal figures associated with any particular sign, these stories do serve, in many ways, as parrables for those born under it.

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In addition to the book, you have written regular astrological columns and advised some A-list celebrities. Everyone seems in awe of your accuracy and insight. How did you develop your expertise?

Through constant practice of our craft and continued exercise of our intuition. Yes, a large marjority of our clients hail from the entertainment, art and fashion industries. As a team we bring different talents to the table. Astrology is a language of symbols and the distinct arrangements of the planets in the various signs and astrological houses. The overall pattern they form, in a person’s astrological charts, speaks volumes on their personality. There are upwards of eighty-four schools of astrology. We are humanistic astrologers. And we center on helping clients make the most of their potential, providing them tools for negotiating their would-be patterns and pitfalls. We all have them. We work on our craft and the technique of interpretation, focusing on the here and now with our clients; while allowing for occasional, as we say, “off the page” flashes of psychic insight.

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.
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