Surely by now many of you have read many interpretations on possible manifestations of the solar eclipse of July 1, 2011. Not only does this eclipse at 9 Cancer 12 create a grand cross configuration with Pluto in Capricorn, Saturn in Libra and Uranus in Aries, it begins a new Saros Series of eclipses, known as New South 13
(when seen from earth the eclipse occurs in the deep southern hemisphere, near Antarctica).
Bernadette Brady wrote extensively about the Saros Series in Chapter 5 of The Eagle and the Lark, her first major book on astrological forecasting:
“Each Saros Series produced a solar eclipse every 18 years plus 9-to-11 days…each one being a half to a full degree closer to, or further from, the nodal axis…Each Series starts as a tiny partial eclipse at either the North or South Pole…an orb of between 15° to 18° in front of the nodal axis.”
She argued that the initiating eclipse of the series could be judged like a natal chart whose energies would influence all the other eclipses in the series—and each series can last for over 1000 years.
We are seeing, on Friday, July 1, 2011 1:53 PDT, the birth of a new series with all the (understandable) anxiety attendant upon any important birth.
Chart for Eclipse July 1, 2011 Nehalem, Oregon
Brady offers the following interpretive ideas in her latest Visual Astrology Newsletter about the characteristics of this new series:
“This theme of this entire series will be about undertaking and or completing large endeavors. At a personal level hard struggles begin to resolve, old thorny issues begin to untangle and the too-hard problems start to become clear.
So if you are stuck or jammed on an issue at the moment, apply your mind and give yourself permission to ‘think outside the box’ or do a little active imagination to help find solutions. Old problems can be solved in this period.
This eclipse is also happening amongst the stars of Gemini which, within the Assyrian astrologer/priests’ letters to their kings, usually indicates the death of a king or the ending of an issue. So endings… but endings of problems, the ending of ‘old’ things which then allows a fresh approach to life.”
Zodiac Window Chartes Cathedral (c.1220): May and Gemini
How might this happen? I’m going to take a clue from the sign in which the eclipse occurs, Cancer.
Cancer is a remarkably complex energy, according to Steven Forrest, in The Inner Sky:
“The Crab. A vulnerable creature. A succulent piece of meat.
The food of gulls. How can he survive? What hope is there for him? He is only a morsel awaiting the predator’s mouth.
To live, the Crab must grow a shell. He must grow a wall between himself and nature. He is too delicate to protect himself in any other way.
With this armor, the Crab endures. He is at peace with his environment. But that success holds the seeds of a perilous transformation. The Crab eats. He matures. And soon he outgrows his shell. It must be shed [emphasis mine]. If he is cunning and lucky, he may live to grow another one. One that is larger, more suited to his expanded state. But only if he is cunning and lucky.”
Watch the moulting--Click on Picture
My take: with this eclipse series, get ready for the molt.
The surprise: it need not be a trauma.
Instead of it being a desperate, painful endeavor, you may find it astonishingly easy.
All the heavens are now conspiring to loosen your shell and allow it to drop away.
A long-standing client consulted me a few days ago, one whose (extremely problematic) natal Saturn in Cancer is only a degree away from this eclipse degree. As the reading proceeded, I was privileged to witness a stunning transformation; a major theme of the reading was allowing energies to flow without having pre-defined what form they should take. This was not about having a mold to pour molten metal into; what was more appropriate was much more like allowing the fantastic forms molten lava assumes as it emerges from the womb of the earth into the air and sunlight. And, under the energetics of this impending eclipse, (along with a personally important Uranus transit) the client’s shell fell away. It’s the only way I can describe what happened. But instead of immediately wanting the shell back, the person expressed great delight at a new sense of freedom, a joy that in going with whatever flowed, of allowing the possibility of “chaotic” creation (as opposed to pre-ordered, “cosmic” creation) meant that one was on the right path.
[NB: “cosmos” is originally a Greek word that means “beautiful order.” Cosmic creation might be likened to the creation story from Genesis, with a Master Artisan directing endeavors in line with his 7-Day Plan.]
Remember in the previous post about “loony” eclipses I opined that possibly solar eclipses are centering, allowing one to get a sense of being on the right path even if the final destination has yet to be seen?
So have faith when the shell falls off; you’re doing what must be done.
It always feels, to me, as if the lunar eclipses are more conducive to feeling nutsoid than the solar eclipses. In solar eclipses a magical thing happens: at totality, one can look directly at the sun. In Egyptian and Hellenistic cultures, the Sun was associated with Divinity and Divine Purpose. Following this line of tradition the Sun, more than Jupiter, Neptune, Pluto or the Nodes, has to do with one’s spiritual purpose, the spark of divinity within. And when is the best time to get a glimpse of that? When the Moon, our nearest celestial neighbor, has protected us, when She has shielded our eyes sufficiently that we can gaze upon the Source of our magnificence without damage. Before the era of satellites and Hubble telescopes, astronomers eagerly awaited eclipses because it was then that they could learn the most about the sun. In the darkened sky during totality, one can get a visual handle on divine purpose.
It can be quite centering, as I learned when I witnessed my first eclipse in Hawaii in 1991. I had just abandoned Corporate America and was still quaking within, wondering what in heck I could possibly thinking of, to leave without the pension, the gold watch…but during the trip, gazing on the spectacle above I was spellbound. I could see solar prominences—93,000,000 miles away!—with my naked eye. And, upon returning from the trip, I suddenly found myself inwardly centered, still unsure how the rest of my life would unfold, but sure that I had done the right thing.
I married on a solar eclipse (one that occurred only 4 degrees away from where the sun will be when a lunar eclipse occurs on June 15!). Any electional astrologer would shudder with horror at such a thing, as I was to find out decades later. However, our marriage is now in its 37th year. Our first year together was extremely difficult, materially and emotionally, yet it never entered my head to abandon the course on which we had embarked. Again, I knew not what I was doing, really, or how it would turn out, only that I was somehow on the right path.
Ah, but lunar eclipses…may be very different animals altogether.
Even though Bernadette Brady’s first book to look at them extensively, The Eagle and the Lark, pairs lunar eclipses with the Saros Series numbers of nearby solar eclipses, she recently told me of an alternate measuring scheme for them. The first solar eclipse of any Saros series begins near either the north or south pole. However, while astronomers use this same method for organizing solar eclipse series that astrologers do, they treat lunar eclipses on their own terms. To astronomers, the first lunar eclipse of a given series begins with a lunar eclipse near the equator. Think about it: the initiation point of any solar eclipse series begins near an axis, a stable point, an anchor, as it were, around which the earth spins. But lunar eclipse series, under this definition, begin at a geophysical point of maximum centrifugal force, which, if not withstood by competing forces (Goddess bless gravity), will fling things far and wide into the great beyond.
Feel flung around a bit? Scattered to the four winds? Running in circles? Maybe the centrifugal force of an upcoming lunar eclipse is in play.
But wait—there’s more!
How many of you have watched a lunar eclipse?
You watch the moon slowly vanish from full to a tiny crescent to “new”, then to a waxing crescent and back to full. It’s as if a whole month had passed within a single night. Any month with a lunar eclipse in it has, symbolically, 60 days!
Feeling that your plate is a bit full? That all of a sudden there is far too much to accomplish in a standard 24-hour day? Well, no wonder! And you thought it was only because Uranus is in Aries…
As I write these words, I am preparing for an anniversary trip which will begin on the day of the lunar eclipse (in which the Sun is close to the degree of our marriage eclipse). And in the middle of typing this up, the phone rings. My spouse’s new boss demands that he be in Massachusetts for their first face-to-face the day after we are supposed to return from our vacation. Since we live in Washington state…okay, quick phone call to the ferry to reschedule our return sailing from Victoria, BC; mad dashing around on his part to get travel arrangements into place; I’ll have to drive him from Anacortes to SeaTac to hop a red-eye for Boston. Lunacy!
But! not everybody will be dashing to and fro. The reason this eclipse is affecting us is because the degree affects our marriage chart and both our birth charts. If you don’t have planets or chart angles in hard aspect to 24 Sagittarius/Gemini, sit back with your popcorn and giggle while you watch the rest of us fly around like bats out of wherever.
OH, BUT WAIT–THERE’S EVEN MORE
The Moon and Sun, in the eclipse chart, are both in paran to Ras Alhague, the head of the Great Healer, that infamous “13th Sign”, Ophiuchus. If you look at the Starlight map, you’ll see the Moon down near his foot.
And since these parans are Foundational (they are tied to the IC) a lasting effect of the eclipse may involve a breakthrough in mending things—what things to be mended? Whatever is relevant to the individual depending on where the eclipse falls in her/his chart. What houses do the signs Sagittarius and Gemini occupy? A balance point may be able to be struck that brings order back to one’s life, possibly not before things come apart, so to speak; after all, if you have too many things in the air, how long will it be before at least one goes crunch on the ground? The solution when the straw breaks the camel’s back is not to blame the camel, but to lighten its load—after you take the poor beast to the vet and get it well again.
Do you really need to have your own back broken before you say, “No more”?
Astrology is an ancient and intriguing discipline. I take it very seriously. One can learn about oneself, the cycles of one’s life, current events, history, cosmology, relationships. We can get all worked up over eclipses, transits and things that go bump in the night.
As an astrologer–it is my job to empower you as you explore possibilities, what to do at certain times or how to look forward and make responsible plans or look back at your life and make meaning out of the past. I think it is the astrologer’s job to offer assistance as you wander through life’s peaks and valleys. It is also my job (as I see it) to do my homework, work with integrity, study my craft, all the while weaving together the disciplines and research that allow us to experience aliveness, empowerment and an understanding of what it means to be human.
So–this week (upon returning from NORWAC–the Northwest Astrology Conference held in Seattle every year)—I am charged with the rather daunting task of sharing the wisdom I gained while studying my craft –
Question: What is the proper way to begin a conference and serious course of study?
Answer: by laughing your head off…
On Friday, Rick Tarnas conducted a seminar titled—The Comic Genius: An Archetypal Perspective
We spent the day watching various clips from Cleese’s Monty Python series and other comedians and entertainers. We looked at their charts–and frankly in this day and age of rather serious events and transits that indicate a momentous time in our history—-laughing and remembering the healing power of laughter was a gift from the Celestial Comedy Gods.
Tarnas pointed out Mercury and Marscontacts in Cleese’s chart speaking to the notion that the mind takes in information (I’m not quoting him exactly – just from my memory and notes) and then one must defend the ideas. Cleese thrives on the thrust and counter thrust—Tarnas noted that he generally begins his pieces with an argument—a contest.
Argument Clinic
Cleese also has a T-Square to Uranus and Tarnas points out that “best humorists—have a high Uranian component”—the trickster (Mercury ) saying that which is taboo (Uranus). Think about some of your Aquarian friends—they are often the ones who at some point in the meeting–point at the elephant in the room with an innocent expression—stopping us in our tracks, so to speak. Tricksters indeed.
John Cleese delivered a memorable memorial speech for Graham Chapman at a memorial service held two months later in the Great Hall at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. Cleese delivered a humorous eulogy for his friend Chapman and took advantage of “this glorious opportunity to shock you all on his behalf,” which he then went on to do.
Graham Chapman, co-author of the ‘Parrot Sketch,’ is no more.
He has ceased to be, bereft of life, he rests in peace, he has kicked the bucket, hopped the twig, bit the dust, snuffed it, breathed his last, and gone to meet the Great Head of Light Entertainment in the sky.
And I guess that we’re all thinking how sad it is that a man of such talent, of such capability for kindness, for such unusual intelligence, a man who could overcome his alcoholism with such truly admirable single-mindedness, should now so suddenly be spirited away at the age of only forty-eight before he’d achieved many of the things in which he was capable, and before he’d had enough fun.
Well, I feel that I should say, ‘Nonsense! Good riddance to him, the freeloading bastard. I hope he fries.’ And the reason I feel I should say this is he would never forgive me if I didn’t. If I threw away this glorious opportunity to shock you all on his behalf. It’s not a funeral, I grant you, but a memorial service is still pretty good.
It is magnificent, isn’t it? You see, the thing about shock . . . is not that it upsets some people, I think; I think that it gives others a momentary joy of liberation, as we realized in that instant that the social rules that constrict our lives so terribly are not actually very important.
Well, Gray can’t do that for us anymore. He’s gone. He is an ex-Chapman. All we have of him now is our memories. But it will be some time before they fade.
Cheer up—you know what they say:
Tarnas pointed out that great comics have strong Sun / Saturn components in their charts. That is to say that the Sun and Saturn are in some aspect to each other or prominent by house or sign—they are, if you will, in ‘conversation’ and depending on the nature of the relationship it becomes apparent how the comedic archetype takes hold in their manner of delivery.
One example a classic Sun/Saturn comedian is Woody Allen who also has Jupiter in the mix such that even the expanding universe is cause for worry.
Colbert at Rally to restore sanity and/or fear 2010
Steven Colbert was born with the Saturn opposing Pluto conjoining Uranus era in 1964. This funny progressive liberal (Uranus) is a trickster cloaked as a conservative Fox News Commentator. He pretends to be the opposite of what he really thinks and says of himself. It is the only way he can stay sane—to laugh. He says if he didn’t – he’d cry. Did you see him at the Correspondent’s Dinner in 2006? Actually the clip watching Bush’s face is equally as interesting as the court jester speaks and shocks and gets away with it as only the court jester can do. (you can click on the chart for an enlarged image)
Only the best comics (Court Jesters) can pull it off. Tarnas played the clip of Colbert interviewing the head of Ploughshares (an anti-nuclear organization) — the interview itself is a poignant example of the current Saturn–Uranus-Pluto catastrophe. Colbert begins the interview and with a serious face asks if the head of Ploughshares will “at least admit that a nuclear explosion is awesome”
And I cannot forget my favorite Ernestine aka Lily Tomlin. Able to transform into character after character—the characters are real and have a structured presence as well as that Uranian shock effect. Tomlin was born under the 1939 Saturn Pluto square, has Mercury squaring Uranus and her Virgo Sun opposing Saturn. She can make us laugh at ourselves as she becomes aspects that we often want to hide, but never fail to recognize.
Here she is as Tommy Velour w/ Michael Jackson & Elizabeth Taylor 2009
Spent time today going off on my own for a while, looking at charts of people/friends I think are funny. I am seeing how Mercury and Uranus and Saturnine flavors are present in their charts. I see how those archetypes come alive when laughter just erupts around the dinner table.
Just think about when you are watching Jon Stewart (I don’t have his chart) or laughing with your friends as you or one of them says something that just has you almost on the floor. It is generally unexpected, taking you over and — then it begins to take hold and even if you wanted it to end…you just can’t stop——Laughing.
Laughter loosens up the body, the heart and the mind and I’ll bet we can find all kinds of medical reasons for it being a healthy thing to do – and do a lot. One of the people I laugh with on a regular basis is my sister, Peggy. We just think about each other and the jokes start coming. Sister jokes. My favorite kind! Best friend uncontrollable laughter often accompanied with trips down memory lane (Saturn) when something erupted and took over and we had to pull over to the side of the road if driving. Those times make life worth living, the comedic archetype and the astrological signatures worth looking at. A hell of a homework assignment for this student!
In honor of my Gemini sister and Gemini friends with whom I have shared a world of laughter here is a clip from Victor Borge. He was our grandmother Peggy’s favorite comedian—and since my funny sis, Peggy, has a birthday this month, I chose Borge to honor her and our Nanny Peggy. Borge was a Capricorn, a classical musician with his Sun conjoining Uranus, Mercury opposing Neptune.
Borge famously said: “Laughter is the shortest distance between two people”.
Surely by now many of you have read many interpretations on possible manifestations of the solar eclipse of July 1, 2011. Not only does this eclipse at 9 Cancer 12 create a grand cross configuration with Pluto in Capricorn, Saturn in Libra and Uranus in Aries, it begins a new Saros Series of eclipses, known as New South 13
A vulnerable creature. A succulent piece of meat.
Skydog Institute 
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