This feature highlights a number of meteor showers, comets and asteroids which are visible during the month of December 2009. Jupiter continues its reign as not only king of the planets but king of the evening sky. Though not visible until about 10pm or so, Mars will start to contest Jupiter’s reign this month. December also brings the Geminids which are one of the best meteor showers of the year.

Note: If anyone has pictures or observations of these objects/events and want to share them, send me a comment and I’ll post them on the blog.

Planets

Mercury - Mercury will be an evening object this month. Though not a great apparition for northern observers, it should be easy to see if you have an unobstructed view of the southwestern horizon. The best time to see Mercury will be when the Moon passes near it on during the evenings of Dec 17 and 18. At that time Mercury will be magnitude -0.5. By the end of the month, it will be rapidly fading and getting closer to the Sun.

Dec 18 - Moon within 1.3° of Mercury

Jupiter - Jupiter continues to dominate the early evening sky. At magnitude -2.2, Jupiter is ~10 times brighter than the brightest stars in the sky this month. Of all the planets, only Venus, and on very rare occasions Mars, are brighter.

Jupiter is located high in the southwestern sky by the end of dusk for easy observation. As has been the case all year, it is slowly moving through the southern constellation of Capricornus.

Dec 21 - Moon passes 4° from Jupiter
Dec 21 - Jupiter passes 0.5° from Neptune

Neptune – For those with a telescope or binoculars and a dark sky, Neptune is located within a few degrees of Jupiter. This month Jupiter and Neptune will experience the 3rd of this year’s triple conjunction as they pass ~0.5° from each other on the night of Dec 20/21. For most of the month, the 2 planets will be very close to each other and within the same field of view of most small telescopes and binoculars. This is a great opportunity to use the easy-to-find Jupiter to help locate the usually hard-to-find Neptune. Jupiter will be a bright magnitude -2.2 while Neptune will be a faint +8.0. Even Jupiter’s 4 large Galilean moons are about a dozen times brighter than Neptune even though they are much smaller. The big reason for the faintness of Neptune is its distance from both the Earth and Sun. It is roughly 6 times further away from us and the Sun as Jupiter. The distance also explains its apparent small size of 2.3″. A good sized telescope will be required to see Neptune as anything other than a faint star.

Dec 21 - Jupiter passes 0.5° from Neptune

Uranus – Uranus is located in western Pisces and is bright enough to be seen in small binoculars at magnitude +5.9 but will still require a telescope in order to see it as anything other than a star (it’s disk is only 3.5″ across).

Mars – Mars can be seen rising in the eastern sky late in the evening (~9:30 pm at the start of the month and ~8 pm at the end of the month). Mars is rapidly brightening and will double in brightness this month as it rises from +0.0 to -0.7 magnitude. By the end of the month, Mars will be brighter than all stars expect Sirius and far southern Canopus. Mars will continue to brighten to a max of magnitude -1.3 at its opposition on Jan 29 of next year. This month Mars will appear roughly stationary as it starts its retrograde motion near the Leo/Cancer border.

Dec 6 - Moon passes close (5°) to Mars

Saturn – Saturn is easy to observe during the last few hours of the night. Located in Virgo at magnitude +0.9, Virgo only rises right before the start of dawn. Telescope users should note that Saturn’s rings are still close to edge-on.

Dec 10 - Moon and Saturn within 7° of each other

Venus - Venus will be too close to the Sun this month for most observers. Some with unobstructed views of the southeastern horizon may catch a glimpse of Venus rising 30-50 minutes or so before sunrise.

Dec 15 - Venus and Moon within 3° of each other

Meteors

December hosts one of the best showers of the year in the Geminids. In addition, the background rate of meteors is still rather high. The year is usually split in 2 with January through June having low rates with few major showers while July through December (really through the 1st week of January) have high rates with many major showers.

Sporadic Meteors

Sporadic meteors are not part of any known meteor shower. They represent the background flux of meteors. Except for the few days per year when a major shower is active, most meteors that are observed are Sporadics. This is especially true for meteors observed during the evening. During December, 10 or so Sporadic meteors can be observed per hour from a dark moonless sky.

Major Meteor Showers

Geminids (GEM)

Along with the Perseids of August, the Geminids are one of the best meteor showers delivering great displays year after year. This year’s Geminids are perfectly timed as the Moon will be nearly New and will not spoil the show.

According to Sirko Molau’s analysis of video data, the Geminids are already observable at the beginning of the month though their rates are very low. The peak is predicted for the night of December 13/14 though numerous meteors should be visible for a day or two on either side of the peak. With a radiant near the star Castor in the constellation of Gemini, the Geminids are one of the rare major showers that are observable before midnight and can be observed as early as 8:00 pm though rates are usually best after 10:00 pm. Under a dark rural moon-less sky, the Geminids can produce as many as 100+ meteors per hour. Observers under suburban skies will see lower rates.

The Geminids are the result of the break-up and subsequent activity of the “asteroid” Phaethon. Why asteroid in quotes? Most meteor showers come from comets yet Phaethon is on a very non-cometary orbit and has never shown any cometary activity. There is still much scientific discussion about what exactly Phaethon is.

More details on the Geminids and their parent “asteroid” Phaethon will be posted as we get closer to its peak.

Minor Meteor Showers

Minor showers produce so few meteors that they are hard to notice above the background of regular meteors. Starting this month, info on most of the minor showers will be provided on a weekly basis by Robert Lunsford’s Meteor Activity Outlook.

Ursids (URS)

The Ursids will produce up to 10 meteors per hour at their peak on December 22-23. That rate makes it a borderline major/minor shower though the Ursids have experienced a number of outbursts in the past. With a radiant near the “bowl” of Ursa Minor (the “Little Dipper”), this shower is also observable all night long though the best time to observe it is during the last hours of the night.

Additional information on these showers and other minor showers not included here can be found at the following sites: Wayne Hally’s and Mark Davis’s NAMN Notes, and the International Meteor Organization’s 2008 Meteor Shower Calendar.

Comets

Naked Eye Comets (V < 6.0)

None

Binocular Comets (V = 6.0 – 8.0)

None

Small Telescope Comets (V = 8.0 – 10.0)

Comet C/2007 Q3 (Siding Spring)

This long-period was first seen on 2007 August 25 by Donna Barton of the Siding Spring Survey in Australia. This past Oct. 7th the comet reached a rather distant perihelion at 2.25 AU from the Sun. Unfortunately, the comet and Earth are located on opposite sides of the Sun so the comet is rather far from Earth. Still the comet is observable in the early morning hours as a ~9.0 to 9.5 magnitude comet in Coma Berenices. At mid-month the comet is 2.38 AU from the Sun and 2.43 AU from Earth.

A finder chart for Comet Siding Spring can be found at Comet Chasing and Aktuelle Kometen (in German).

A nice collection of images can be found at the VdS-Fachgruppe Kometen (Comet Section of Germany) and Seiichi Yoshida’s Comet Homepage.

Comet 88P/Howell

P/Howell is an evening comet and currently the brightest in the sky. Howell is a short-period comet and takes only 5.49 years to orbit the Sun. Ellen Howell was a student at Caltech when she found the comet on photographic plates taken on 1981 August 29 with the 48″ Palomar schmidt.

In 1981 the comet was on an orbit that never brought it closer to the Sun than 1.62 AU (perihelion distance). As a result, it never got very bright. A relatively close approach to Jupiter in 1990 changed its perihelion distance to 1.40 AU. Further perturbations by Jupiter have decreased its perihelion distance to 1.36 AU. The closer perihelion distance allows the comet to get bright enough for small backyard telescopes. In addition, the comet seems to be running about ~2 magnitude brighter than usual. No obvious reason for the additional brightening has been observed yet.

This year perihelion occurred on Oct 12 so the comet is currently moving away from the Sun and should be fading. A day after perihelion I observed the comet from Tucson with a 12″ dobsonian. The comet was very difficult to observe from the city. At the time, I estimated its brightness at magnitude 8.5. The comet should be a fainter (95 mag or fainter) this month. The comet is located low in the southwest sky after dusk and will spend the monthcrossing Capricornus. At mid-month P/Howell will be 1.53 AU from the Sun and 2.02 AU from Earth.

A finder chart for Comet Howell can be found at Comet Chasing and Aktuelle Kometen (in German).

A nice collection of images can be found at the VdS-Fachgruppe Kometen (Comet Section of Germany) and Seiichi Yoshida’s Comet Homepage.

Asteroids

Binocular and Small Telescope Asteroids (V < 9.0)

(4) Vesta

Though not as large as Ceres, Vesta is more reflective making it the brightest asteroid in the Main Belt. Vesta is peculiar in that it appears to have evidence of volcanism on its surface. Similar to the Moon, Vesta may be covered with large expanses of frozen lava flows. It is classified as a V-type asteroid and is the only large asteroid with this classification. Many of the smaller V-type asteroids are chips of Vesta blasted off it by past asteroid and comet impacts. Vesta is similar in size to Pallas with dimensions of 347×336x275 miles or 578×560×458 km. Vesta will also be visited by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft which will arrive in 2010.

Vesta is once again observable in the morning sky before the start of dawn. It is brightening from magnitude 7.7 to 7.2 as it travels just north of Regulus in Leo.

A finder chart (needs to be flipped upside down for Northern Hemisphere observers) can be found at the Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand. Finder chart for Vesta from Heavens Above.

Many local residents are asking when they’re going to see some work starting on Neptune’s redevelopment project.  After appointing Bowmer & Kirkland as the preferred contractor, it is hoped that work will start just before Christmas.  The first part will be  civil engineering works, including draining the Marine Lake, followed by refurbishment of the promenade.

• The Marine Lake, new promenade and boating lake are due to be completed by Summer 2010.
• Morrisons Supermarket ready for fitting-out in January 2011.
• Travelodge, Light Cinema and some of the leisure buildings should be ready for a fit out by Spring 2011
• Remaining leisure buildings and lido will be completed by Summer 2011

If you need any further information, please get in touch and I’ll do my best to get you some answers.

©2009 by Donna Cunningham, MSW

  For women, especially, transits to the birth Moon are often major markers in the life cycle. These aspects can usher in anything from puberty to leaving home to marriage and childbirth to menopause and children leaving the nest to widowhood and the retirement home. Each development in these roles evokes profound responses, both in the woman herself and in her partner and family members. Major emotional readjustments are required. Our relationship with the inner or outer mother is likely to be changing at the same time.

 For men, these transits may primarily operate through the women in their lives. This is most true of men who have disowned their own lunar hemisphere and projected it onto women. It is least true of men who have embraced and integrated their lunar traits. At any rate, an outer planet transit may find a man going through major realignments of his relationships with key women and the woman within. Sometimes a key woman moves out of his life, sometimes an important new woman comes in, and sometimes both.

 If he has been overly dependent on these women to provide him with nurturing, emotional awareness, and security, the codependency may end. He may experience vulnerability in the process that can make the lunar realms more conscious and real to him. He may find himself taking on homemaking or child care tasks, perhaps due to an addition to the family.

 When Saturn transits the Moon, we typically take on more family responsibility, and it is one indicator of having a child, especially the first one. Saturn is a major time marker and corresponds with formal roles like parenthood. Saturn aspects to the Moon often concur with beginnings or endings in female roles and family structures. We might buy our first house or sell the old family homestead. Men may find themselves helping with homemaking or child care tasks, perhaps due to the family growing larger or the wife going to work.

 Or, there is both an ending and a beginning–we marry and leave home. A woman enters the menopause but becomes a grandmother. Beginnings are accompanied by seriousness and worry about new commitments. Endings can be accompanied by sadness and anxiety about the passage of some nurturing structure. Still, we can find gratification in our new level of maturity, hard-won capabilities, and adult status.

 During the easier transits, you could crave a child—and may give birth, adopt, or take in foster children. There could be a strong desire to teach or work with children in a alternative, integrative setting, like a performing arts camp, or a Montessori or a Waldorf school. Under stressful aspects, you could deal with fertility difficulties or face either an unexpected or unwanted pregnancy or gynecological problem. Conditions of the female organs or hormones, like endometriosis or menopause, may come up. Look to emotional root causes for diseases or if menopause comes early.

At worst, you could experience a loss in your relationship with a child in some sense–a loss that is seldom literal, and more often philosophical or emotional. Under positive aspects, you could heal any of these issues–a prodigal son or daughter returns, you find or are found by a child given up for adoption, or you have amazing results with an alternative cure for your hormonal imbalance.

In general, a change in attitude toward women or femininity alters the quality of your relationships, ultimately for the better, even if the short-term brings strained relations or endings. You are starting to internalize mother and nurturing, setting an example for your dependents to begin doing the same.

 (Note because Saturn and Pluto are square for much of the coming year, if you’re having a Saturn transit to the Moon, there’s a good chance you’ll be having a Pluto transit as well.  If that’s so, you would want to read about Pluto transits below.)

When Uranus transits the Moon, we typically rebel against traditional female and family roles, chafing at the constraints they bring and insisting on more freedom. Either with or without validation from family, friends, and society, we experiment with alternative ways of meeting lunar needs. If we’re unwilling to transform dependency patterns, change may be thrust upon us from outside, seemingly without warning. If we’d been paying more attention to undercurrents in these areas, however, we might have seen that change was long overdue.

In either case, a support group may be helpful, either emotionally or practically. With a trine the revolt is less drastic. We may get away with it, earning the covert admiration of those around us. With more difficult aspects, the pressure to conform to tradition may be more intense, and thus the moonquake when we rebel may be more disruptive. Of course, Uranus always carries the possibility of emotional detachment, an enlightened perspective, and social evolution. Don’t rationalize your feelings about such modifications out of existence, however, or they may one day erupt and surprise you.

When Neptune transits the Moon, there is disillusionment with the feminine roles. Women may feel burned out and trapped by lunar responsibilities and incapable of continuing to nurture or rescue others. The home feels like a prison, the children or partner’s demands overwhelming. For men, there can be a period of idealizing an important woman followed by disillusionment when her humanness is revealed.

 We want someone to rescue us and take us away from all this. Even if the white knight, the guru, or the mother of all mothers does appear, there is a high price for submerging yourself this way. It stops further growth and ultimately becomes suffocating. The womb becomes toxic after it outlives its usefulness.

 When Pluto transits the Moon, an intense confrontation over women’s roles can be played out. If pregnancy occurs, it may be  more about  issues in the relationship than about a baby. Still, a shift in role can be an intense metamorphosis in which a woman experiences the power of her femininity. When we become mothers, we transform on a deep level and become closer to mothers of all times.

 Puberty and menopause are other Plutonian shifts in feminine physiology and spirit. The urge to nest or perhaps to transform our living space may become obsessive. Pluto is deep, internal, and powerful, so the woman or man who experiences it can never again take the lunar realms so much for granted. We may grieve about leaving behind a time when we could innocently depend on Mom and her surrogates without having to repay in kind.

With all outer planet transits to the Moon, it’s important to have a grasp of the birth Moon, for it describes our stance toward these roles. It shows how we carry them out, what we feel about them, what models we had, and how we respond to changes in them. A woman with Moon in Aquarius is likely to experience far more conflict about fitting into traditional female roles than a woman with Moon in Cancer or Capricorn. A man with Moon in Taurus expects the woman in his life to be as old-fashioned as he is. Since Taurus is fixed earth, he may experience change as deeply disruptive.

 More Posts about the Moon on this Blog:

• Using the Daily Moon Sign to your Advantage 
• How To Use The Moon For A Daily Emotional Weather Report
• The Moon Signs and their Emotional Habits 
• The Void of Course Moon–A Lunar Sabbath? 
• Eclipses and Their Effects 
• Why Transits to the Birth Moon are so Challenging
• Cancerians, Memory and Emotion
• Fool’s Gold—the Slippery Slope of the South Node

Note: This has been an excerpt from my out of print hard-copy book, The Moon in your Life, which you can sometimes find at Amazon.com or used book sources.  a 50-page excerpt from The Moon in your Life. Read more about it here: NEW: FREE BOOKLET FOR SKYWRITER SUBSCRIBERS!  If you’re already a subscriber and want a copy, forward the most recent email post to me at moonmave@spiritone.com. To sign up for a subscription, go to the top right hand corner of the blog and click on “Subscribe.”  Then send me an email with your subscription confirmation or an email post with a request for the booklet in the subject line.

March 21, 2010, a new Aries Equinox is upon us, opening the astrological year. The Aries Equinox is traditionally considered the most powerful indicator of the year’s future trends, because Aries is the archetypal beginning Sign, for both Northern and Southern hemispheres.  At this moment in history Aries is becoming also a focal point of interest to astrologers for another, very important reason.

Uranus’ ingress into Aries, no time to waste.

The top event for this season is in fact the entrance of Uranus, the sky god, into fiery Aries, on May 28, preceded by the ingress of Chiron in Pisces, on April 20. Three of the four planets orbiting beyond Saturn have now moved Sign (Pluto, Chiron and Uranus). Neptune will follow, entering Pisces in April 2011, and, for good, in early 2012. All these consecutive changes in the zodiacal position of these Destiny Makers, between 2008 and 2012, characterize the present time and near future as one of the most rapidly transformative period in recent history, reflecting a renaissance of a sort, but also huge social, political and ecological upheavals.

These transits are momentous, and Uranus in Aries can be considered, together with Pluto in Capricorn, one of the most dynamic and also potentially dangerous of all these transits.

Uranus takes an average of seven years to transit a Sign, returning to the same position every 84 years (7×12), its entire orbit containing a whole epoch of cultural development. Any planet’s ingress into Aries represents also a new start. Uranus will accelerate the pace of changes, boosting the collective urge to rebel against the status quo. This is however a brief taste of Uranus in Aries, lasting only until August 14, when this eccentric planet will re-enter Pisces in retro motion.

Uranus will be back in Aries for good in 2011 and remain there until 2019. What effect would Uranus in Aries have over the generation of people who will be born between 2010 and 2019? Let’s look into the past for answers: the last Uranus in Aries generation was born between 1927 and 1935. They have been identified by some as the “Rebels without a cause’, a class of defiant people who had the courage to be themselves, and often became actively engaged in changing the rules and anticipating trends, thus paving the way for those who followed them.  Many of them personify very well the rebelliousness and modernity of Uranus boldly expressed through the Aries medium. To name a few of the best known: James Dean, Mikhail Gorbachev, Che Guevara, Buddy Holly, Ted Kennedy, Coretta Scott and Martin Luther King, Shirley McLain, Rupert Murdoch, Peter O’Toole, Elvis Presley. The power of these people to excite and inspire the generations that followed them is a testimony to their unique individuality.

The birthdays now in line with this transit are: Aries (March21/23), Libra (September23/25), Cancer (June21/23), Capricorn (December22/24). These same people have been under a barrage of heavy duty transits since early 2008, first from Pluto in Capricorn, then from Saturn in Libra and now from Uranus! You may start feeling as if you have been singled out by some overwhelming fate, ruthlessly playing with your life. This latest Uranus’ contact could bring the situation to a sort of climax for you, hopefully making you more aware of the fact that every future is built on the ruins and riches of the past.  Searching for your own individual path will be the challenge in the next two years. A sense of isolation may prevail if you find that your present situation and current relationships are not reflecting your urgent need for freedom and self determination. It would very much depends on what use you have made of the Plutonian and Saturnine energies, in recent months and years. Are you now taking full responsibility for your life and stopped procrastinating (Saturn)? Have you identified and dealt with those aspects of your life that have had an obvious negative/destructive influence in the past (Pluto)? If you have done your home work, then Uranus can now bring you the independence you have yearned for a long time. If you have not made these steps, then Uranus could feel instead like another upheaval you don’t want to know about, prompting you to move out of your comfort zone, risking much of the security you have built in the past.

Generally speaking, Aries is not an easy place for Uranus and the transits of the planet of rebellion in the Sign of impulsivity promises that the Uranian drive for renewal will be thrust upon us in a rather abrupt way, probably not giving us enough time to assimilate the changes. This is not, I’m afraid, a very promising position in regard to world peace, because the combination of the iconoclastic and autocratic character of Uranus and the fiery, belligerent nature of Aries could be an explosive one. Both archetypes are masculine, if not hyper-masculine, with a marked tendency to antagonize rather than cooperate and seek peaceful resolutions. The ingress of Uranus in Aries also anticipates an intense contact Uranus-Pluto (90 degrees angle) that will become exact between 2012 and 2014, but is already very close. The mingling of the highly transformative energies of these two planets will manifest as make or break situations that we all will have to face. Accepting changes will not be any more a matter of choice. A remarkably similar situation happened in the late 20s and early 30’s, when Uranus was also transiting Aries (1927-35) and Pluto was in the opposite point of the zodiac that it is occupying now, in the Sign of Cancer. They formed their 90 degrees angles between 1930 and 1933. Not only this was the period of the Great Depression, with the fall of Wall street in October 1929, but also the beginning of an ideological  transformation in Europe and the far east that led to the rise of dictatorships and eventually to the outbreak of World War II. Destruction of the past is an appropriate key phrase to describe the combined energies of these planets. Then it meant war, the autocratic and aggressive side of the aspect obviously prevailing. It does not have to mean war in our near future, but certainly a confrontation of sort and a need to embrace changes (Uranus), no matter the cost, or perhaps even the means (Pluto) we choose to employ.

The Uranus-Pluto’s pairing with the end of the Mayan Calendar gives this particular aspect even greater significance, together with the passage of Neptune into Pisces (another 2012 event).

The Jupiter-Uranus’ Aries Conjunction,

the escalating urge for action

Jupiter has entered Pisces on January 18. It will transit the whole Sign in record six months time, entering Aries on June 6 2010, and then returning to Pisces, in retro motion, between September 2010 and January 2011.

On June 8 Jupiter will meet Uranus on the cusp of Aries, the most active point of the whole ecliptic. This is exciting stuff. We will experience the same transit in September 2010 and January 2011, again close to pivotal times, the Libra Equinox and Capricorn Solstice. It certainly represents more than a passing trend.

Jupiter embodies the power that enlarges and improves on everything. In what way can we then see an improvement or enlargement of Uranus’ energy? Uranus represents, first and foremost, the urge toward change and modernization of values, also new technologies and all revolutionary ideas. Jupiter then will increase this urge. Great innovative ideas could come out of the collective brain, a new philosophical perspective that will affect, amongst other things, the way we view and use technology. This is a daring and risk taking influence that could greatly help to overcome the impasse of the still powerful Saturn with its conservative stance. The negative side of the same could be found in a tendency to rush into things without adequate forethought, to become arrogant and overbearing, expecting too much of circumstances or people, or trusting too blindly in our abilities. It is definitely a mixed bag for all of us and the early Cardinal Signs in particular, Jupiter making us more and more impatient of those restrictions that are nevertheless unavoidable.

All these transits on the cusp of the Cardinal Signs, the pillars of the yearly astrological calendar, really suggest a quickening in the pace of events and the need to get into action without delay to face problems head on. This is true not only for Cardinal Signs people (Aries, Libra, Cancer, Capricorn) but for all of us. The whole configuration suggests a very eventful year ahead, with old Saturn still doing its best to put a keg in the wheel of progress.

Another Pass of the Saturn-Uranus opposition

Saturn, as usual when prominent in transit (see, among other things its opposition to the Sun on the day of the Aries Equinox and the conjunction to the Sun at the next Libra Equinox) is suggesting the need for caution and a more conservative approach, when every other planetary indicator points instead to the need for decisive action.

With all these different strains on the Planet it is not surprising that we may not achieve as much as we wish. A saturnine period is one during which practical matters, money, work, health, duties override other considerations, when ideals have to bow down to realities, and our collective horizon seems to shrink a little.

Saturn says: you are not ready, you haven’t quite done your home work yet; long term commitments and hard work are necessary to back up the lofty dreams of a better future. Saturn will help us, as always, to keep our feet firmly on the ground, hopefully without stifling our hopes.

At the end of April Saturn (retrograded in Virgo since April will again oppose Uranus, as it had done in November 2008, February and September 2009. This is not the last of this cosmic tag of war, but it is the last involving Virgo and Pisces. Another opposition will become exact in July 2010, with Saturn in Libra and Uranus in Aries, and stay with us well into 2011.

The birthdays directly aligned to the April opposition will be Virgo (September19/22), Pisces (March17/20), Gemini (June18/21), Sagittarius (December18/21). While your need to create a future for yourself is becoming stronger (Uranus), the past is revisiting you now, making you feel that instead than moving forward you are going backwards at the moment (Saturn). Some unfinished business still need to be addressed and cannot be brushed aside if you want your life to move out of this impasse. The past has still some valuable lesson for you; ignoring this is not an alternative in the circumstances.

Considering the collective potential of this transit many astrologers think that it could bring about more of the financial vows we all experienced in 2008/09. The Virgo/Pisces’ dynamics is again pointing to the need to be more humble and realistic, to sacrifice something in order to become more inclusive, shifting our focus from Ego centred values to more compassionate and spiritual ones.

The Equinox Moon and the power of Medusa

Looking at the Aries Equinox chart for 2010 many astrologers would notice the Moon’s position, on the 26^th degree of Taurus. The reason is that this is the longitude of a very important star, Algol, in the constellation of Perseus. From antiquity this star has been universally considered an evil, unfortunate and violent influence. Apart from these superstitions, what is the archetype associated with Algol and why it has become such a symbol of vow and catastrophe? In Greek mythology Perseus is the typical hero who has to courageously and cunningly face deadly perils in order to re-gain his kingdom. Algol (western rendering of the Arab name Ra’s al Ghul, the Demon’s Head) was Medusa, the monster Perseus had to kill in order to regain his lost kingdom and rescue his maiden princess (his soul). This Medusa, the legend tells, was once a beautiful woman, transformed into an evil monster by the wrath of the god Neptune, against whom she had sinned. She represents the ugly face of resentment and hate, with her power to turn everyone who looks at her face into lifeless stone. To slay her Perseus had to avoid staring at her, but uses instead a magical reflective shield that Athena, goddess of wisdom, had given him for this purpose. Once the deed is accomplished the hero places Medusa’s head over Athena’s shield and returned the same to the goddess who, from then on, used it to deter evil in the world.

The symbol of the mirror-shield is an obvious one, showing the need for self reflection when tackling our inner demons, because direct confrontation with the same could prove fatal to our quest. The light of reason and wisdom is needed in order to handle the monster safely, as we need a protective and supportive environment and loyal helpers in order to face those deep seated feeling of resentment that we carry with us since childhood. To confront them head on, without the aid of self reflection and spiritual understanding, could be psychologically very destructive.

The potential for good of Medusa herself becomes clear when out of her severed head, apart from vengeful demons, sprang also Pegasus, the winged horse, a symbol of the soul freed from the shackles of past pain and loathing. So there is a lot of positive stuff to be found in the Algol/Medusa’s legend. For sure the prominence of Algol in a chart already packed with challenging aspects warns us that the road ahead is a perilous one, where perpetuating old hatreds could prove fatal to our spiritual evolution. To see the beauty (Pegasus) in those we consider our enemies (Medusa) is the secret for successfully using this star’s energy without being psychologically paralysed by her terrible stare.

As Diana K. Rosenberg, an esteemed expert on Fixed Stars, beautifully put it in her internet article on Medusa : ‘…Algol … in a chart does not necessarily mean that you will inflict, or be the victim of, horror and mayhem … but that you will be aware of the depths of suffering that can occur, whether through human depravity or “Acts of God”; …. your life path will require that you come to terms with that level of experience… The polarities of bigotry or tolerance, violence or kindness, cruelty or compassion, war or peace are issues that are unavoidable and must be dealt with under Medusa.’

The seasonal Mercury’s loop, April 18 to May 12

Our trickster planet, the child of the solar family, will perform its station and retrogradation in the Sign of Taurus, affecting in particular Taureans born between April 21 and May 3. These few weeks could be the ideal time for a break from routine and duties. If you slow down the pace of your life you are less likely to experience frustration. If you have to stay on the job, expect some delay and inconsistencies. Many little things could happen that will measure or even stop your progress for a while. Keep your appointments and deadlines fluid enough to accommodate last minute unexpected trouble. This will be a test of your mental flexibility and ability to adapt, not usually your forte.

Transits to the Fixed Signs

Taurus, like all the other Fixed Signs (Scorpio-Aquarius-Leo) are also still influenced by the slow passage of Mars through Leo (since mid October 2009!). Mars is finally moving in direct motion at Equinox time, indicating a better period ahead to tackle business with renewed energy and confidence, apart from the short interval of Mercury retrogradation.

The central experience though for some Fixed Sign people will still be the life changing transit of Neptune through Aquarius (with us until 2012). Aquarius (Feb.16/19), Leo (Aug.20/23), Taurus (May18/21), Scorpio (Nov.19/22) are still under the spell of Neptune, often feeling as if their sense of reality has changed to the point that they are unable to act and relate the way they always did. When prominent in transit Neptune opens new dimensions in our life, new channels of understanding, but, unless we are psychologically prepared and spiritually aware, these could prove more bewildering than helpful.

Chiron in Pisces, 2010-18, a healing transit

I have left the discussion of this transit last, not because it is less notable than others, but because it is one that promises some real healing.

Pisces, last in the sequence of twelve Signs, represents the end product of the entire cycle and also contains, in seed form, the future cycle. Chiron, the healer centaur of ancient lore, with his wisdom and knowledge of nature’s remedies, in Pisces will show us the way to merge with the natural environment, to participate emotionally, not merely intellectually to the suffering of the less privileged and of the Planet itself.

On the negative side this position of Chiron may increase the risk of serious pandemics, because the medium of Pisces, with its openness and fluidity, is ideal for the spread of infections, the absorption of poisons and the lowering of our collective immunity. Tears and powerlessness, with the loss of control are some of the traditional attributes of mystical Pisces, when its energy is mishandled.

The Earth may become more susceptible to illnesses brought about by pollution and neglect, the same applying to all the beings that populate it, animals and humans. The situation on our planet may worsen before the healing can begin.

One way or the other, this long transit will make us realize that, if any member of the human family suffers, the whole of humanity suffers. The potential for collective healing through this configuration is self-evident, but only via spiritual surrender of ego centred attitudes.

Chiron in Pisces basically suggests that to cure the body (ours, the Earth’s) we need to heal the soul.

Happy and wise transits, everyone.



Respect For Pluto Over Time

Graph by: samuelm via Graph Jam Builder

Writing this blog has been a joy to me in that it has open the door for my own understanding in what I really feel and believe in, as far as astrology is concern and what it means to me, but at the same time I hoped, I haven’t given the impression that I am trying to teach or develop a new approach to the subject.  With Mercury conjunct Uranus in the ninth sextile Pluto in the eleventh and trine Neptune in the first house, my thinking has always taken a different approach, contrary to the main stream, and in writing these articles, it was my wish to share my thoughts with others.  The reader needs to decide for himself what information he wants to keep in order of integrating these ideas with his own thinking and studies, and that which he wishes to discard.  With Jupiter in Cancer sextile to my Sun in Taurus, the need to share any good news is a top priority; otherwise the dust will hit the fan.

With this thought in mind I realized that my previous mentions of the benefic versus malefic might be taken as contradictory depending on the situation and the time being considered.  In the natal chart at the time of birth until about twenty one years of age I believe these aspects fulfill their mission, but as we grow and learn, I believe they begin to reverse and in some charts take on the aspects of the other planets they resound and blend with.  My reason for this way of thinking, is if the benefic planet endows an individual with all the money in the world and he squanders it, and his life takes a downward turn, is it the planet’s fault or the individual?  Or if the malefic Saturn brings the individual into poverty at birth and because of this, the person has the reason and purpose to work hard to achieve success and wins, who gets the credit or blame?  Thinking this way, one only comes to the conclusion, that the aspects definitely have their power over good and bad, but the individual can make a difference to the outcome, if he realizes that he can alter the end result.

This made me think, and come to the conclusion, that the benefic and malefic aspects and planets come into this world providing their best and worst to the individual, but can be colored by the other aspects and planets to become more neutral and give a different out come, then expected.  It seems to me that these two are similar in nature to Mercury, and tend to take on the colorings of their surroundings which are expressed through the conscious or subconscious of the individual involved.  It is in the understanding of what the outcome, the benefic or malefic would produce if we continue on the path in our chart that we can change the direction and purpose, to align with our wishes and the final result we desire.  As I have always said about the art of astrology, is very true with the benefic and malefic aspects and planets, they only indicate what might happen, and we as individuals, can make it happen or not.  The benefic and malefic makes no judgments, but work with their energies to fulfill their mission, so in essence they are neither good nor bad, but how we use them, brings forth the results.  So in truth these aspects can change their direction by how well we understand their forces and purposes, and change them, if need be, to reach the goals and happiness we want for our selves in this life

Team 6 (aka the best team ever): The Tapestry of Cupid

Canto 6 Stanzas 29-46 describe Cupid’s Tapestry.

While exploring the rooms and halls of Castle Busirane, the player finds on the ground a small piece of an old tapestry; and upon picking it up, the magic woven into the cloth pulls them in. They will appear within the tapestry itself, though at first they won’t realize where they are. Gods and goddesses from several of the old Greek myths appear, as do three of Jove’s lovers; but, very few of them realize where they are or that they are mere shells, one-layered avatars of the people and divinities they actually represent. Only Athena, Goddess of Wisdom, is wise enough to puzzle out the mysteries of tapestry; and she and Danae are the only ones who can point the way back to the Castle for the player.

The land in the tapestry is that of a beautiful, flourishing forest; and yet, the ruins of one of Athena’s temples lies within it, and a calm ocean borders it. The strange mix of landscapes is Cupid’s doing; he has brought together people and places to give tribute to his many victories over the other gods. Europa, standing near the player when they first appear in the tapestry, will introduce them to the land they have entered; but her own ignorance as to the nature of the tapestry will limit her helpfulness. Semele likewise is more than willing to tell the player her own story, as commanded by Cupid, but will not tell the player how to leave. Jove and Apollo each grieve for their lost loves, while Neptune joys in the memories of Theophane; and these gods will instruct the player to seek out Athena in the ruins of her temple. Upon finding her, she will reveal all she knows of the mysteries of the tapestry and how to escape it, and the player’s journey through this twilight zone will end when they find Danae, who stands in quiet contemplation of her bittersweet story near the exit back to Castle Busirane.

Quests:

There are no quests in Cupid’s Tapestry, merely conversations; though the NPCs will attempt to do as Cupid instructed and tell their tales to the player, there is never a moment where the player’s hand is forced. Should they wander for long enough, the way back to Faerie will reveal itself eventually.

You want a post on Saturn squaring Pluto? Okay, here’s your post on Saturn squaring Pluto.

As a rule, I have a pretty bad track record with relationships. (“YOU?! REALLY?!” my readers gasp. You’re funny, guys.) As a therapist’s kid, as someone who read Deborah Tannen when she was six, as someone who’s spent considerable time observing and evaluating other peoples’ relationships professionally and just because they interest me, you’d think I’d be awesome at them- and I am, when giving advice to other people. When dealing with my own, however, I’m ashamed but forced to admit that at worst I can be a little bit like a twelve-year-old Jennifer Jason Leigh. Typically, this has been blamed on my natal Neptune-Jupiter conjunction in my 7th House. “You give other people the benefit of the doubt too much!” “You idealize other people too much!” “You’re a Pisces, need we say more?”

Well, yes and no. The first two are true- I know I do these things, and although it might not look like it, I’m very mindful of when I’m doing it and whether or not it’s getting out of control. I get better at modulating it every time. However, even when I think I’m doing so much better that this time will be different, inevitably I end up falling into the same trap. And after ages of agonizing over IS IT ME OMFG WHAT AM I DOING WRONG, I kind of realized what’s actually happening here. (Well, Saturn squaring Pluto in my 5th and 7th Houses made me realizing what’s actually happening here.)

This is what’s actually happening here: Okay, yes, I’m very Piscean in my affections. Yes, I have let certain relationships carry on way, way too long because I was not willing to acknowledge very serious red flags- or at least terminate the relationship when I was good and mad enough instead of letting someone else break me. But I’ve made efforts, very strong efforts, to move past that. I’ve dissected and examined and analyzed nearly every pattern of mine in relationships, I’ve spent years of my life modifying my behavior so that I’d be better equipped to have successful relationships, and I’ve realized that at a certain point there’s really only so much that I can do. I may have Piscean tendencies in relationships, but I also have Venus in Aquarius at the top of my chart. As far as girlfriends go, I am not a clingy girlfriend. I am not a high-maintenance girlfriend. I do not immediately drop all of my interests and goals when a relationship ends because they were actually my boyfriend’s interests and goals that I had taken on for lack of my own. For the most part, the only thing I’m really doing “wrong” is being emotionally forthright and having strong opinions- which I can’t just stop doing, and wouldn’t stop doing to appease someone else. That would be a lousy relationship.

No, amazingly enough, the Pisces self-blame has to step back: it’s not me. I realized how my Neptune-Jupiter conjunction in the 7th House has been playing out for most of my adult relationships (and by adult, I mean out of college- it’s such a different dynamic when you’re not in college anymore). See, the 7th House isn’t just your attitude towards relationships- it’s also YOU in relationships, that is, the role you play. “Isn’t that your Ascendant?” you might be asking. “No, not quite,” I reply. Your Ascendant might not be who you truly are, but ultimately it bears qualities that are important to you, that consciously or not you want the world to see. This is not necessarily true in an intimate relationship. Your Descendant, the Ascendant’s opposite, reflects the type of person who complements you, who makes up for what you lack- but the planets in the 7th House reflect what kind of partner you can be to that person, to that prospective complement.

So take me, for instance. I have a Sagittarius Descendant, and without fail, I always, ALWAYS end up involved with Sagittarius Suns or Sagittarius Risings. Like literally, it’s to the point where I’m shocked if someone I like is not one of those. Yet I keep coming back. Clearly something about Sagittarius is attractive to me- is it the good attitude? The sophistication, real or imagined? The height? The build? Whatever. The point is, after so many disappointments with this type of person, I’m very well aware of the potential hazards, and I do try to protect myself. But nonetheless, my Neptune-Jupiter conjunction plays out, and not the way you’d think. It’s not so much that I idealize the other- and this took me a while to get to intellectually, even to admit- it’s that they end up idealizing me.

Not idealizing me in the sense of “I love you too, Dream Woman!” I mean that in the Neptunian sense of the word- the Pisces sense, of escapism and illusion and fantasy. Although I don’t try to, I end up being literally whatever some guy wants me to be. I remember when I was thirteen or so, I read one of those Sydney Omarr books about Pisces in which he wrote that “Pisces is the most dangerous ‘other woman’ of the zodiac,” and being a Jan Brady thirteen-year-old who’d been to second base over my shirt once I was like YEAH RIGHT WHATEVER. But as a more experienced adult, I can say with certainty that IT’S SO TRUE. If a man is not actually using me to cheat on his girlfriend, he is using me as a distraction from something else- his dissertation, some encroaching sense of melancholy, fear that everyone will think he’s crazy if he doesn’t have a girlfriend RIGHT NOW. I can’t ever just be “the girlfriend,” like the real, down-to-earth, non-intimidating girlfriend. I always have to represent something larger than or totally different from his experience. His girlfriend is almost always skinny and flat-chested and mousy and wears no make-up, so he can give himself a cookie for being attracted to me, who looks kind of like a Rubenesque redheaded Stevie Nicks without all the blow. His dissertation is almost always on some boring ivory tower shit that even he finds repellent, so he feels titillated but at the same time somewhat dirty being with someone who actually, you know, worked for three years between undergrad and (almost) grad school. His encroaching sense of melancholy is almost always totally his own fault, because he can’t be honest with himself about what it is he actually wants, so the idea of a woman who actually is really smart and knows about a lot of subjects and has diverse interests like gender studies and horror films and astrology and the occult and makes proactive decisions about her future is like WHA-AT.

And since for the most part I exist to the other solely as a distraction, as their distraction, it’s imperative that I don’t change. This is usually where things will start to go south- when it becomes apparent to the other that *gasp* I am not solely what they imagined me to be. I’m not talking about a situation where, for instance, someone is totally nice to you for the entire duration and then breaks up with you by screaming in your face that you meant nothing to him and calling you an unhinged lunatic. (That is called… I don’t know what, but it’s freaking nuts.) What I’m talking about is this crazy idea that women have different moods and aspects, just like men do! Whoa! The men who appreciate that I can be sweet and affectionate are put off and intimidated when they discover that I actually have really strong opinions and will call them out on dumb shit they do. On the other hand, the men who appreciate that I have really strong opinions and will call them out on dumb shit they do are disappointed and pissed off when they discover that I can be sweet and affectionate. If that’s not Neptune-Jupiter at work, I don’t know what the hell is. I mean, Christ, we wouldn’t even have mythology if the gods were incapable of getting angry or jealous or self-righteous or acting differently than we’d expect of them. How could anyone possibly think it might be okay to expect that of me? Or of any human?

So what am I supposed to do about that? Well, there’s always Jung’s transcendent function, or some way out of a problem that really has nothing to do explicitly with any of the variables. I’ve been following Donna Cunningham’s incredible Pluto-Saturn Preparedness Kit, which you should also check out if you haven’t already. Following Donna’s guide, I’ve made inquiries into volunteer programs with an academic focus, I’m revisiting Julia Cameron and the idea of “morning pages” (or “evening pages,” for the days I have to get up at 5 a.m.), and I’m making more of a conscious effort to include social time with my solid friends between studying and sleeping. All fantastic, helpful things- but ultimately, I still have to get around this relationship bugbear somehow.

Do I treat others the way that they treat me? No, of course not. As much as I’ve fantasized about emotionally destroying some perfectly nice boy (Pluto final dispositor), I would never actually do it. While it may look to me on the wounded outside that the people rejecting and using me have boundaries, they probably actually don’t- it takes a serious miscalculation of risk to be able to do that to someone, and not just, you know, get help for your mental problems or freaking break up with your girlfriend if you hate her so much.

What I have to do for myself is to learn to exercise real boundaries, and to be incredibly Saturnian about how I start to view potential partners. It’s really unfortunate, but I’ve gotten to the point that if it seems someone likes me, I can’t totally trust it. But I’m starting to think that’s a good thing. “Oh, no, Lucy, you’re only twenty-five and a half, how can you be so jaded???? How come you can’t do what I did in 1979 and just go out and meet someone at a bar????” (Because I know someone out there is thinking that, and whoever you are, you need a nice tall glass of shut the fuck up.) I need to start holding people to a higher standard. I think I’ve done more than enough of my fair share to make sure I’m emotionally equipped to be in a relationship, even in pursuit of ambitious personal goals. That’s not to say I don’t want to be in a relationship at all- I do, for Christ’s sake, I really do. I just don’t think I deserve to waste my time on someone who doesn’t care that much about me- or hell, even about themselves. Plutonian sacrifice, well, I know all about that. It just has to be directed towards the right place. My health, I can’t afford to sacrifice. My education, certainly not. A short-lived relationship with someone who’s probably using me because he can’t get his shit together? Yeah, I don’t think I need that.

In the meantime, I will be sitting up with the Greek gods and the Orishas, being imperfect.

Melting Watergate—Some facts and figures that oppose the prevailing hysteria about global warming/climate change (21:58):

References: http://www.fdrurl.com/tnclimate

Stefan Molyneux runs Freedomain Radio, the largest and most popular philosophy show on the web. His books, podcasts, and videos are available free on the web. Mr. Molyneux accepts donations with the utmost gratitude.

The post where I explain why 8 planets are bad science has been generating both good traffic and a rather interesting discussion in the comment boxes. Part if it is about double planets.

If you check the page, on this blog, where I present the current (and highly flawed) definition of planet and my alternative, you’ll find two things. One is that my alternative is quite simple and quite radical. Those long posts I keep mentioning but never get the time to write are mostly meant to explain all the reasoning behind that simplicity and radicality, along with why I think so poorly of the IAU’s definition. But I have been lacking the time to dive in those waters, and the best you may find for now are some hints spread here and there. One of the places where hints are to be found is the thread of comments in that post.

But maybe it’s time to actually write something a bit more solid than mere comments. And, since any place is good to start, why not taking the lead from the visitors to this blog and write about double planets?

The concept of double planet is very similar in its essence to that of a double star: two objects that share, more or less, the same characteristics, and that are gravitationally bound to eachother. However, whereas a double (or its extension: a multiple) planet has no definition anywhere, there is no question about what a double (or multiple) star is. A star is multiple if there is more than one star revolving about the same center of mass, the system’s baricenter. Note that nowhere is there any reference to where that barycenter lies. A small-mass star may be so close to a heavy star that the system’s barycenter lies inside the heavy one, and the system is still a double star. Undoubtedly.

The problem with planets arises because the only objects that are considered planets are those that revolve around stars (according to the IAU, it’s even worse: only the Sun can have planets, which is the most ridiculous aspect in that definition, but let’s forget about that particular nonsense for now). The fact that every planet that is part of a multiple-body system (i.e., the planet and its satellites) also revolves around that system’s center of mass murks the waters. True, in most situations the planet is much larger than its satellites, and the system’s center of mass lies deeply within it. But what if some day we’ll find two bodies of very similar sizes revolving around a center of mass that lies outside the planet? Which one is the planet then? Both? None?

And what to you mean “what if”? We already know one such system: Pluto-Charon. Even the Earth-Moon system may one day be in that scenario, for the Moon is constantly drifting away from our planet, which means that the system’s center of mass gets closer and closer to the Earth’s surface. But so far, it’s only Pluto-Charon. Pluto has traditionally been considered the planet and Charon the moon, but Pluto’s traditional standings have been getting a serious beating recently, and that one is no exception. In the first draft of the IAU definition of planet, swiftly defeated, Charon was to be “promoted” to the condition of planet and, together with Pluto, would form a double planet. The criterion was the position of the system’s barycenter.

That criterion is, however, just plain awful. Since the position of a system’s barycenter depends on the mass of the system’s components and on the distance between them, such a criterion could result in absolutely ridiculous situations. Imagine we find some fine day a system where the satellite’s mass is close to the planet’s and it’s on a highly eccentric orbit, meaning that the distance between the two objects varies a lot during an orbit. With the right masses and distances, when the two bodies get closer, the barycenter dips within the heaviest of the two bodies, and when they drift apart, the barycenter jumps from within the heaviest, hovers for a while above its surface only to dip again in the next orbit. Or, in other words, using that criterion, for part of each orbit the system would be composed of one planet and one satellite, and for the rest of each orbit it would be a double planet, obviously composed of two planets.

Sheer nonsense, don’t you agree? You do. I’m sure you do.

There are ways to solve this problem, of course. One is to say that there is no such thing as double planets: the heaviest of the set is a planet; the others are satellites and that’s it. Another one came up in the discussion of that post of mine: just establish an arbitrary limit of mass ratio between the two, above which the system would be considered a double planet, and below which it would just be a planet-satellite system. Since I’m very strongly opposed to establishing arbitrary limits (which is one of the reasons why I really hate the current IAU definition, but that’s for subsequent posts), I dislike the second option almost as much as I dislike the barycenter criterion. The first one is not arbitrary, so it’s fine with me.

Except that I have a better idea.

Let’s cover every part of the sizes’ scale. We’ve talked about stars and saw no problem there, we’ve talked about planets and saw a complete mess, let’s now see what happens in the lowest area, the asteroid, or small body, zone. Asteroids have also been found in associations of two or more gravitationally bound sets. The first asteroid found to be a binary was Ida, when Galileo (the probe, not the astronomer) photographed its moonlet Dactyl, in 1993, but in the last 16 years we’ve found almost 200 more such systems. Including systems with more than two components, the first of which was Sylvia, which has two (much) smaller companions: Remus and Romulus. What’s the terminology there?

Unsurprisingly for such a new set of concepts, it’s also a mess. People talk about asteroids and their moons, or moonlets, like they talk about planets and their satellites. However they also talk about binary asteroids and triple asteroids, without taking mass into account. The Ida-Dactyl system is a binary asteroid, despite the large difference in sizes between the two bodies. Hermes, number 69230 in the asteroid list, and composed of two components of almost the same size, is also a binary. That’s because, if taken independently, they both would surely be considered asteroids, so there’s no ambiguity. An asteroid moon is also an asteroid.

And that’s my great idea. If you look at my definition of planet, you’ll see that it only mentions roundness caused by self-gravity, not the position each body occupies in the great merry-go-round in the sky. This means that, yes, the Pluto sistem is a double planet, with two planets and two smaller bodies. An ice dwarf / ice dwarf kind of double planet. The Earth system is also a double planet, this time a terrestrial / terrestrial dwarf kind of double planet. Mars, on the contrary, is a single planet, despite being accompanied by two small bodies. Jupiter isn’t single and isn’t double: it’s a multiple planet, with 5 planets belonging to different categories (gas giant, terrestrial dwarf, maybe also ice dwarf) and a lot of smaller bodies. Saturn and Uranus are the “multiplest” of the planets, the first composed of 8 planets and a lot (really, a lot) of smaller bodies, the second comprising 6 planets plus debris. And Neptune is, again, a double planet. A gas giant / ice dwarf kind of double planet. Or perhaps an ice giant / ice dwarf. Plus small worlds, of course.

This way you get coherence along the whole scale of celestial objects. And solve easily and without ambiguity the whole double planet controversy. That’s on the plus side. On the minus side, it would make us change radically the way we look at these things. But maybe that’s not really a minus; you see, there are other reasons to do it.

But that would be for other posts.

How old are you? Twenty-one again? Some of us (ahem) have been twenty-one twice over, with a few years added on…

Would it sound any better if I told you that I am 16,544 days old? Or 22,823,360 minutes, perhaps? While I’m not sure that I feel any better, if you would like to see how old you are in days or minutes, click the link below:

http://www.timeanddate.com/date/duration.html

And here’s a website that I DO like – it tells you how old you would be in days and years if you lived on any of the given planets in the Universe… If I lived on Mars for example, I would be a mere twenty-four years old - and if I lived on Jupiter I’d have just turned three! All I have to do now is get there. TARDIS, anyone?

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/edu/age.htm

Scheduled for an upcoming winter launch is a new observatory to study the sun’s influence on Earth and the space around with the use of several instruments studying our star simultaneously on multiple wavelengths.Just one of several upcoming missions to study the sun, the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO)’s goal is to better understand the energy that generates the suns magnetic field, and the energy used for the creation of solar winds, and other variations in solar activity.

This image illustrates the resolution capabilities of the SDO, STEREO, and SOHO spacecrafts. SDO’s AIA instrument (right image) will have 1/2 greater image resolution than STEREO (middle image) and 3/4 greater imaging resolution than SOHO (left image). The image cadience also varies. SDO takes 1 image every .10 of a second. At best STEREO takes 1 image every 3 minutes and SOHO takes 1 image every 12 minutes.

SDO will measure the sun’s interior, its magnetic field, the plasmas of its solar corona, and other areas using 3 instruments. The Atmospheric Imaging Assembly which will image the sun’s atmosphere in multiple wavelengths, and compare data from sun’s interior. The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager which will extend the capabilities and resolution of the SDO. And the Extreme Ultraviolet Variability Experiment which will measure the EUVs spectral irradiance to better understand the effects on the Earth’s Climate and Near-Earth space.

Just one of many instruments aboard the SDO. This is The Extreme Ultraviolet Variablity Experiment. It will measure the solar extreme-ultraviolet (EUV) irradiance with unprecedented spectral resolution, temporal cadence, and precision.

A February 3, 2010 launch date is the current target.

Overview of the Solar Dynamics Observatory mission.

The tallest known auroras in our solar system were discovered as Cassini imaged the first “northern lights” on the planet Saturn.

The auroras have a vertical pattern, which resemble tall curtains flapping in the wind. Some of which are seen 750 miles above the planet’s northern hemisphere.

Auroras occur on Earth as we all know, but they occur on other planets as well in our solar system. The new images from Saturn help us gain more knowledge into how auroras work. “Seeing these things on another planet helps us understand them a little better when we see them on Earth.” said Andrew Ingersoll of the Cassini imaging team.

An aurora, shining high above the northern part of Saturn, moves from the night side to the day side of the planet in this image recorded by Cassini.

The new data seems to be helping already. Auroras occur when charged particles from a planet’s magnetosphere enter the atmosphere. So the heights of the auroras on Saturn say much about its atmospheric differences compared to the Earth.

The Earth’s atmosphere is mainly oxygen and nitrogen. The atmosphere of Saturn is primarily hydrogen, which is much lighter. This causes the atmosphere to extend out further from the planet, in turn increasing the height of the auroras.

An aurora, shining high above the northern part of Saturn, moves from the night side to the day side of the planet in this movie recorded by Cassini.

Cassini has imaged the auroras of Saturn before, but that was using its ultraviolet and infrared imaging tools. These new images taken in October were captured with the visible light camera. The images were originally in black and white, but the imaging team enhanced them with a orange false-color to highlight the auroras.

The oxygen and nitrogen of the Earth’s atmosphere are what give our auroras their green, blue, and red colors. More needs to be studied about the atmosphere of Saturn to have a more accurate idea of what the colors of its auroras are.

A Cassini scientist, Dr. Andy Ingersoll, explains the flickering “northern lights” high above Saturn, shown for the first time in a visible-light movie.

As an astrologer, I’ve learned long time ago that I can predict timing of events with much greater certainty than their nature.
For instance, I can say that events that will begin to transpire this December and become more obvious starting in April of 2010 will crest around August 1, hitting Americans directly where their wallet is with violent force, because all potent forces of heaven will be attacking Venus in the U.S. horoscope.
Since Venus traditionally rules money and relationships, American relationships will suffer either within the country or abroad. I cannot rule out civil unrest, although I would not go as far as predicting civil war.
Unfortunately, I really cannot say what exactly is going to happen. I don’t believe anybody can. In my experience, even the best of psychics often make mistakes when it comes to future events, because we really have the power of the free will.
With this power we still cannot change the forces of time that spin the heavens, but we may lessen or even change their impact to some degree. Of course, our ability to do so is much more evident in our personal lives than on the national or international scope.
But even mundane astrologers are still handicapped in their ability to predict, since no nation has a birth certificate with official time stamped on it. The U.S., for instance, has at least 4 horoscopes that astrologers like to consider. Even its date of birth is in dispute, since historical facts point to July 2 rather than July 4 that we all celebrate.
I can assure you though, that no matter what happens around August 1 of 2010, we will survive, and the world is not going to come to an end in December of 2012 either.
About 100 years ago, a little known guru of a much more famous guru Paramahansa Yogananda wrote a tiny treatise “The Holy Science” that went unnoticed by even Yogananda’s disciples.
However, this little gem deserves almost as much reverence as Bhagavat Gita. There, Sri Yukteswar recalculated yugas (Divine divisions of time) based on precession of equinox and position of the Sun in relationship to the Galactic Center.
Yugas describe the relationship of Light and Darkness in terms of time.
There are 8 yugas in total in what is called 1 Divine Day of 24,000 years. They start with the Ascending Kali Yuga of 1200 years, during which the light of human consciousness gradually increases.
He pinpointed the beginning of that yuga at the year of 499 a.d..
This means, that in the 1699 a.d. the Ascending Dwapara Yuga began, and it will last until 4099 a.d..
During Ascending Dwapara Yuga, the light of human consciousness increases enough to develop amazing technologies based on atomic and molecular manipulations of material reality, as well as developing abilities to manipulate electricity, magnetic and gravitational forces and the like.
By the end of this yuga, humanity as the whole is also going to perfect mystical and occult techniques, enabling itself to expertly manipulate reality.
During the Ascending Treta Yuga, personal relationship with God is going to become commonplace, and during the Ascending Satya Yuga, the humanity, once again, would enter its Golden Age.
The Descending Satya Yuga will follow, and the Divine Light would begin to gradually diminish until it would be totally shut out during the Descending Kali Yuga.
If you look at the known human history, you would agree that the year of 499 a.d. falls smack in the middle of so called Dark Ages, and as of 1699, humanity began technological advancement in earnest.
Since we are at the threshold of the Advancing Dwapara Yuga, the technological advancement we have seen so far is only the beginning.
I predict that during the next decade technology is going to continue develop in leaps and bounds, particularly computer and nano technology, revolutionizing our relationship with the world. E-readers are going to become commonplace, and even catalogs are going to be on e-readers rather than on paper. TV and computer technology will merge completely. We are going to use “TV sets” for reading e-mail, solving “websudoku” puzzles, and reading news as much as watching them.
Cyber space is going to continue being the new gold mines of the world economy, and green technology is going to improve and cheapen enough to become common place.
Nano technology is going to affect every facet of our lives, from clothes to medicine, but it is in medicine where it is geared to make major impact. By the end of the next decade, we may finally defeat cancer, and our greatest concern is going to be infectious diseases.
I would be watching with interest the time period between October of 2010 and April of 2011 for some remarkable technological break-through, as Neptune – Uranus mutual reception returns for the last time.
Economically, during the next decade the U.S., Europe, Russia, China and India will continue to be the main engines, as the U.S. will continue to lead in consumerism, Russia will continue to dominate the market of natural resources, China will remain the world’s greatest factory, and India is going to finally reap the benefits of its investment in education.
But the U.S and Europe are going to be much poorer, and India, Russia, and China much richer.
This will change the political picture, as Russia and China will become the 2 main super powers.
I also believe that Pluto in Capricorn is going to undermine democracy everywhere on Earth and squash all civil unrests that flare up, and the U.S. is no exception. Of course, Orwell’s Big Brother comes to mind, but it would still remain the exaggerated version of reality. While all powers are going to strengthen their control, no country is going to descent to the fascist or communist regimes of the past.
Terrorist acts and the fear they spread are going to dominate the world politics. I am certain that Israel and Palestine are going to remain being locked in conflict, and Middle East is going to remain being the nest of terrorism. But acts of terror are going to be more sophisticated, using technological sabotage as well as suicide bombers.
During Ascending Dwapara Yuga, Light and Darkness fiercely compete with each other, and the world is full of shadows. But the Light is getting stronger every year, so, in my mind, the most important developments of the next decade are going to begin taking hold as of March of 2012. That is when Neptune is finally going to settle in Pisces, its own sign, while Uranus straddles through Aries.
I believe that spring is going to mark the beginning of the quiet revolution within human mind. I don’t mean the plentitude of small technological devices that would allow us to control them with the force of our thoughts. They already exist and are about to invade our everyday life. I bet, one of the most sought out presents this X-Mass is going to be the game where people can move a ball with their mind alone.
No, I mean the unbelievable rise in consciousness on individual level. We saw a similar spurt in consciousness during the early 80s of the last century, when Uranus and Neptune traversed Sagittarius at the same time. Sagittarius, the country of Jupiter is the sign of expansion of consciousness, while Uranus represents break-trough and Neptune is the symbol of oneness.
In Aries, Uranus is going to emphasize unique individuality of each of us, while Neptune, strong in its own sign, is going to bring mysticism and spiritual oneness to the forefront of consciousness.
Of course, for many, Neptune in Pisces would signify the descent into drugs, and Uranus in Aries coupled with Pluto in Capricorn could easily describe flare ups of anarchy. After all, Pluto walking through the sign of government and corporate structures is going to change them all big time, forcing many into quiet and not-so-quiet revolt.
Uranus in Aries is going to ensure that Big Personalities rule that moment of time, and independent contractors are going to outnumber employees everywhere. Even employees are going to be much more independent, often working from home thanks to continuously evolving technology and loss of all kinds of corporate benefits.
The Ascending Dwapara Yuga by no means signifies the end of suffering, and Africa is going to continue to be the epicenter of human suffering for a while. Changes of climate, poverty, infectious diseases and terrorist acts are going to continue being our terrible bane for a few decades longer, as Darkness does not give up so easily.
It is going to be up to us as individuals to uphold the Light, and Neptune and Uranus are going to give us a little hand there during the next decade. After all, all the disasters that befall the human kind are there to forge the kindness of the heart, so God may enter it.

A significant event in the life of the International Space Station took place on the 20th of November. ESA, the European Space Agency handed over a new interconnecting module for I.S.S. over to NASA. Node 3, or Tranquility as it was named by NASA, is one of Europe’s final major hardware contributions to the construction of I.S.S., along with a connected observation module known as Cupola

Ownership of ESA’s Node 3, Tranquility, the final European-built habitable module for the International Space Station (ISS), was transferred from the European Space Agency to NASA on 20 November 2009.

Credits: ESA – S. Corvaja

Hi RES VERSION AVAILABLE HERE

Those in attendance at the handover were Bernardo Patti, ISS Program Manager in ESA’s Directorate of Human Spaceflight, NASA’s ISS Program Manager Michael Suffredini, Robert Cabana, NASA’s Director of the Kennedy Space Center, William Dowdell, NASA’s Deputy for Operations for ISS and Spacecraft Processing, Secondino Brondolo, Head of the Space Infrastructure at Thales Alenia Space Italy and selected media organizations.

ESA’s Cupola was mated to Node 3 in September 2009, and is now ready for launch.

Credits: ESA – S. Corvaja

Hi RES VERSION AVAILABLE HERE

Tranquility and Cupola will be carried to I.S.S. by Space Shuttle Endeavor. The current launch date right now is February 4, 2010.

Tranquility will house many systems related to life support including oxygen generation and water recovery. Also, equipment such as a treadmill will be housed there for the purpose of physical conditioning of the crew.

Node 3 consists of a pressurised cylindrical hull 4.5 m in diameter with a shallow conical section enclosing each end. It is almost 7 m long and will weigh together with the Cupola over 13.5 tonnes at launch.

Credits: ESA – S. Corvaja

Hi RES VERSION AVAILABLE HERE

Listen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBK9P2AEBjA

Another band I’ve started paying attention to in the last year or so. The first song I heard by them was Send a Little Love Token, another great song.

Lyrics here, more below:
Ten english pounds and these hot pavement fields,
As though I’m moving to the end, am I moving to the end of your loving?

How, how did I do this?
Me, I put the water on my heart.
Why didn’t I notice such cold detachment from the start?
Oh, the joys they slammed down and the one in this town was bright enough.

Without joy, joy, joy in the rain I could feel forever the same.
Without joy, joy, joy in the rain I could feel forever the same.

So how, how did I do this?
Oh, me I put that box around my heart.
Why couldn’t I notice such cool detachment from the start?
Oh, the joys they slammed down from the one in this town is bright enough.

Without joy, joy, joy in the rain I could feel forever the same.
Without joy, joy, joy in the rain, yeah I could feel forever the same.

Without joy, joy, joy in the rain I could be forever the same.
Without joy, joy, joy in the rain, yeah I could feel forever the same.
Without joy, joy, joy in the rain, oh I could feel forever the same.
Without joy, joy, joy in the rain I could feel forever the same.

So what is it about this song? For me it has that 50’s/60’s elastic cool groove. Just so smooth. And her voice just oozes. I love the whole sound of this song, even without the lyrics, which are interesting in their own right.

Talking about the end of a relationship, she is doing the standard retrospective. Why didn’t I know? Why didn’t I see. And realizing that joy is need throughout to last. I love the imagery of the water and the box. And I love the line ‘cool detachment from the start’!

Keep an eye on this band…

The Weekend Space Review is nearly at full operation. We are working on the layouts and tweaking the site so it best displays the content presented. We are really excited about this project.

For now, we leave you with a video. This is a lunar flyover video of the moon created by one of the incredible images captured by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, launched this past June. Enjoy the video and thanks for stopping by.

Miserere Luminis, black atmosferic din tinuturile canadiene, reprezinta o combinatie stralucita intre Icare, Neptune (Gris) si Annatar (Sombres Forêts). Anul acesta au lansat primul album, album omonim, de pe care va propun piesa care m-a impresionat cel mai mult: Senectus.

“Subaru?”  Yep! That’s the Japanese name  for a little purse of celestial gemstones better known in the West as the “Pleiades,” or in many cultures throughout the world as the “Seven Sisters” or some variation of that idea.  And  yes, I said “challenges” – plural, because there are two:

1. how many Pleiads can you see with the naked eye?
2. and can you see – with naked eye, binocular, or telescope – the faint nebulosity that surrounds these stars?

It was that nebulosity that apparently inspired Alfred Lord Tennyson as he penned this famous tribute in Lockesley Hall:

Many a night I saw the Pleiades,
Rising thro’ the mellow shade,
Glitter like a swarm of fireflies
Tangled in a silver braid.

Beautiful, but no words or image can do justice to the live, real-time experience of standing outside on a crisp December evening, raising binoculars to your eyes, and seeing these icy diamonds! And yet all that “cold” blue light really indicates they are very young, very hot stars, all of which are part of an open cluster. But more on that in a minute.  For while the Pleiades lead the observing agenda for any December, in 2009 we have some other great choices as well, including a splendid meteor shower and four nice planets to view – five if you want to get up early. And we’ll add the Pleaides “follower”  - the huge reddish star, Aldebaran – to our list of guidepost stars as well.

So let’s take a look at this month’s prime time chart – a chart that applies to the eastern sky as seen from mid-northern latitudes, 45 minutes after sunset as usual, but with this quibble – you  may not see the Pleiades that early. If you don’t, try locating November’s guidepost star, Capella, in binoculars and sweeping south (to your right), or locate Aldebaran, and sweep upwards with your binoculars. The Pleiades should pop into view. If you still don’t find them, just wait, they’ll appear as the sky gets darker. In any event, you’ll want to wait until later if you’re going to take the challenge. So here’s the chart with our new star, Aldebaran, front and center. Yes, Aldebaran – an Arabic name which means “the follower” and refers to the way this star seems to follow the Pleiades across the sky – and who wouldn’t!

Also, we’ve added a “kite” asterism with Capella – last month’s guidepost star now highinthe northeast – as the dominant star int he asterism. (This is actually the classic constellation Auriga, the Charioteer, but I think the Kite is easier to see and remember.)

Click image for larger view. (Chart derived by modifying Stary Nights Pro screen shot.)

Click here to download  a black-on-white version of the preceding chart, suitable for printing in landscape format.)

OK – here are the highlights we’ll be covering this month:

• The Pleiades makes a challenging sight for naked eye observation – how many can you count? And they’re a delightful sight in binoculars or small telescopes  – but can you see the nebulosity?
• The Geminids meteors should put on a terrific show with no interference from the new moon on December 13-14.
• We draw closer and closer to Mars as we chase it down in our orbit around the Sun and this makes it both brighter to our naked eye and bigger in our telescopes.
• And speaking of telescopes, great Jupiter, dropping low in the southwest, has its third and last – for several years – close encounter with Neptune.
• And yes, Saturn is back for early risers with rings that are becoming much easier to see again in asmall telescope!

The Pleiades (Subaru) challenges

Even without binoculars, the Pleaides – also known as “M45″ and “the Sevens Sisters” -  can be quite dazzling for those with good eyes and dark skies. Not me. With my aging eyes they tend to blend together and even when I put my glasses on I can only with care see four or five separate stars. Younger eyes do much better. A recent 6-year-old visitor to Driftway Observatory saw them – as many adults do – as the “Little Dipper.” Well the six brightest stars do form a tiny dipper, but the real Little Dipper isn’t nearly as dazzling, is much larger, and is in the north, not the east.

So how many stars do you see? Take your time. Patience is the key. I suggest you get a comfortable beach chair, lean back, relax, and look for at least a solid minute at a time.  How many should you see? I suspect most people who take the time to observe carefully get as many as six to 10.  Walter Scott Houston, who wrote a Sky and Telescope magazine column when astronomy was new to me in the 1950s, counted 18 with the naked eye! And the visual observer I most  admire today, Stephen James O’Meara, says in his book “The Messier Objects:”

Although largely symbolic, the age-old association of the Pleiades with the number seven remains fixed to this day – to the point that some observers swear they cannot see more than seven members, even though the Pleiades contains 10 stars brighter than 6th magnitude. Some observers question how it is possible to see 10 Pleiads in The Seven Sisters (a demonstration of the power of words . . . ) The fact is that almost three times that magic number of stars can be seen without magnification by an astute observer under dark skies.

O’Meara says he logged 17 while observing in Cambridge, MA – which hardly has dark skies.  “The trick” he says, “is to spend a lot of time looking and plotting.” This business of “time on target” is something I find hard to convey to new observers. But it is the key. Another key is simply experience. I frequently see things that those with younger eyes don’t see, simply because I’ve seen them before and know exactly what to expect. Crossen and Tirion in their book “Binocular Astronomy” have this general piece of advice which certainly applies here:

When I first began observing with binoculars I could not see the Rosette Nebula at all, but now it is not difficult for me even under poor sky conditions.

The most important thing in observing is to really look – a mere glance at an object or a field is simply not enough. You must keep your eye at the oculars for at least a full minute at a time.

That said, don’t let the numbers and reports by others discourage you – the Pleiades are yours to enjoy no matter how many you count.  Another noted popular astronomy author, Terrence Dickinson, writes in his book “Nightwatch,” that he has “a tough time seeing more than six stars with the unaided eye, even under excellent conditions,” but he also notes that some of his “astronomy students have reported seeing as many as 11.” And turn binoculars on them and you should be able to easily count between 25 and 50.

The second challenge is more subtle. It involves the nebulosity that shows up in nearly every photograph of this cluster. No, don’t go looking for such a photograph. It will only prejudice you as to both the nebulosity and the fainter stars – and besides, you’ll never match a long exposure photograph with your eyes because film, or the modern CCD accumulate  much more light than our eyes. The Pleiades, as I mentioned, are young stars – less than 50 million years old, and in astronomical terms that means they’re mere babes. (Our star – the Sun – is about 5 billion years old. ) The Pleiades are not far removed from the cosmic womb of gas and dust in which they were formed. Until fairly recently it was assumed that this nebulosity we see was the last wispy remains of the nebulae in which the Pleiades were formed. Today it is more generally thought that this nebulosity is just a happy accident – an entirely different gossamer cloud of gas and dust that is reflecting  the brilliant light of the Pleiades as they pass through it.

In any event, Tennyson seems to reference it when he refers to his “swarm of fireflies” being in a “tangled braid.“  When I look with the naked eye I certainly don’t see it. But be careful. A couple of these stars are quite bright and because they’re close together, their light tends to blend and perhaps give the impression of being surrounded by nebulosity. Perhaps that’s all Tennyson saw, especially as the stars were near the horizon.

So while I assume Tennyson was talking about a naked eye view and perhaps glimpsed the nebulosity in pristine Victorian skies free of modern light pollution, I feel this second challenge is best pursued with binoculars and small telescopes.  While there is nebulosity near several stars, the brightest part is southeast of Merope. (Merope is identified in the downloadable charts at the end of this section.)  So I would look for this first.  What you need to do is look for a difference in the darkness of the background sky in this region. Using binoculars move away from the cluster a tad to avoid the glare – see how dark the sky is? Now move closer to it – do you detect any change in the background brightness?  Again, be careful you don’t confuse the the glow around a bright star with nebulosity.

When you think you have spotted the nebulosity it would be helpful to quickly sketch its location on the provided chart – then compare it with a picture of the Pleiades, such as this one, to see  if your impression of the location and size of the nebulosity matches what the camera reveals.

When to look

To take the challenge you want the Pleiades high in a dark – moonless – sky. In December of 2009 your first opportunity for this will  be around December 5 or 6th.  The Pleiades will be well up about two and a half hours after sunset, and the Moon will not have risen at that time.  As the month progresses, you can wait later and later without interference from the Moon because the Moon rises later each night until New Moon. (And later is better because the Pleiades will be higher in the sky.) Until  about December 19 or 20th – by then the Moon is in the western sky when you look – far away from the Pleiades, but still likely to make it difficult to see the faint stars and nebulosity.  This is a good lesson, however, for looking at any faint astronomical object. When we do that we are constantly balancing these different factors of how high the object is above the horizon – the higher the better because the higher it is the less atmosphere you need to look through to see it – and where the Moon is, because its constantly changing position and brightness wash out the sky anywhere near it.  But as you can see, there’s a solid two-week window when you can take the Pleiades challenge in the middle of this month – assuming the weather cooperates! And, of course, the Pleiades will still be with us through the winter.

Some helpful charts

Click image for larger version. (This chart is derived froma Starry Nights Pro screen shot. A printer firendly version appears in the links which follow.)

There are three printer-friendly charts listed here, but for starters I suggest you download only the first two. They both show the brightest Pleiads but the second one has no names on it and is meant for you to use – and add to  – when taking either challenge.  Put it on a clipboard and take it, a pencil, and a soft red light to your observing location.  Then when you spot something you can mark its location in relation to the brightest stars. Once you’ve done this, take a look at the third chart which shows the Pleaides as seen through a typical pair of binoculars. This chart will tell you whether fainter stars you identified and noted on your chart are in the sky or just your imagination

Chart 1 – Download this chart as a starting point for your observations - and to get to know the names of the Pleiads. (Atlas and Pleione are the parents of the seven sisters.)

Chart 2 – Download this chart to use for note-taking while you’re observing.

Chart 3 – Download this chart to check for faint stars you detected to see if you marked them in the right position.

Finally, compare your observation of the nebulosity with a picture of the Pleiades, such as this one,

The Geminids show December 13-14

Click image to get an enlarged version. (Modified from Starry Nights Pro screen shot.)

(Download a printer friendly version of the preceding chart. )

This is a terrific meteor shower because unlike the Perseids in August and the Leonids in November, you don’t have get up at 3 am for a good view – though for East Coast observers  midnight is best this year, though plenty of meteors should be seen earlier. The radiant point for this shower is in the constellation Gemini and it is already above the eastern horizon as it gets dark.  By about four hours after sunset it is well up in the east. Since the meteors appear to radiate from this point – and you can see them anywhere in the sky – then at this stage more than half the shower meteors should be above the local horizon. So it is really worth it to start looking as early as 7 pm on December 13.

However – there’s always a however – the shower this year is due to peak at 5 hours Universal Time. That translates to midnight EST December 13/14. So my personal plan is to start looking for these meteors at 11 pm and keep looking until 1 am EST.  That gives me the best opportunity to see the most meteors, assuming the weather cooperates.

Here are some tips to get the most out of this shower no matter where you are and when you look:

1. Look up – constantly! Geminid  meteors can appear in any section of the sky – it’s just if you traced them backwards they would seem to come from one area near the constellation Gemini.  (Yes, you’ll see more most likely if you look in the general direction of the radiant point, but you may miss some too, so don’t hesitate to look around at other sections of sky.  When I say “look up” I’m not being facetious. Meteors wait for no man or woman – and there’s no instant replay. I’m amazed at how many meteor watchers don’t follow this simple rule – they talk to companions, and seem to look around at or near ground level, and then grumble when someone else spots a brilliant meteor that they missed.

2. An adjustable beach chair or lounge is great, as well as a sleeping bag or blankets. Even in warm climates, you get cold sitting still for an hour or more under a clear sky.  You’re just one big radiator sending off heat to the universe!

3. Bring binoculars and when you see a bright meteor, use them! Look where the meteor just appeared and you are likely to be rewarded by seeing the trail of smoke it leaves. You may be able to watch this for several seconds as the winds in the upper atmosphere start to twist and disperse it.

Finally, just enjoy being out there. The stars of winter are especially brilliant, not because the skies are clearer and drier (in the northern hemisphere they may be) but because there are simply more bright stars, especially in the region around the constellation Orion, which can be see from just about anywhere on Earth.

Chasing Mars

Here’s the thing – Mars and Earth are closest to one another every 2.1 years – but exactly how close they get each time varies over  a 16-year cycle.So we get close every 2.1 years, but the closest approach happens about every 16 years. This means that some close approaches are much better than others, so the best views of Mars happen every 16 years! And where are we now in that 16 year cycle? Somewhere near the bottom. But play the hand you’re dealt. If you want the best view of Mars in a backyard telescope, then the next four months offer you the best chance you’ll have until about 2014. (In 2012 it will actually be a little worse than this time.) On a positive note, this time Mars is relatively high in the sky for Northern Hemisphere observers and its fun for naked eye observers to just trace its path among background stars. This chart provides you with a starting point for Mars in mid-December.

Click image for larger version. (Modified screen shot from Starry Nights Pro.)

Click here to download a printer-friendly version of this chart.

Mars will change constantly in December. Each night it will rise earlier and be a bit brighter, doubling in brightness from the beginning to the end of the month – but still outshone by Sirius.  Its position against the background stars also changes. For most of the month it appears to move in the general direction of Regulus. However, on the 21st it stands still, then starts to move in the opposite direction – westward. This is called “retrograde” motion and is caused by our overtaking it as both planets orbit the Sun.

Here are the key numbers and dates for this apparition of Mars, according to Sky and Telescope magazine:

• Mars will appear larger than 10 seconds in diameter from December through March – that’s big enough to see some features in a backyard telescope.
• In late January it comes closest but will still appear to be only 14.1 arc seconds in diameter at its largest – on a really good year, such as 2018, it will appear to be over 24 seconds in diameter .
• In 2012 – when we get another close look – it will actually be a tad smaller at its best because it will be a little farther away.

What should you be able to see? Frankly, not that much. But it’s still fun to try. With a good telescope and good astronomical “seeing” conditions, you should be able to make out some features on Mars such as the northern polar cap, and large, irregular olive drab splotches that stand out against an orange background.

Jupiter’s close encounter with Neptune

Jupiter has had three close encounters with Neptune this year – this is the last. (To read about the first, see this post.)  While Mars is a target for late evening viewing, Jupiter needs to be seen early in the evening, for it sets earlier each night. With a telescope you can start viewing 45 minutes after sunset.

You can find Neptune reasonably near it – using a telescope – all month, but it will be closest during the few nights around December 21st. This changes rapidly, so even if you are a few days either way Neptune quickly gets lost in the background of stars of similar brightness. But on or near December 21 it will be less than one degree away from Jupiter and you should be able to fit both planets in the same field of view if you are using  a low-power, wide-field eyepiece. But keep in mind, at magnitude 8, Neptune is significantly dimmer than Jupiter’s moons.

As a bonus, the crescent Moon is just five degrees away, above the two planets, on December 21. Here’s a finder chart for December 21, 2009 showing Jupiter and Neptune as seen in a low-power telescope view with the image flipped left-to-right, which is what you will see when using a telescope thathas a diagonal mirror. With a reflecting telescope the image also will be flipped AND upside down.

Click image for larger view. (Starry Nights Pro screen shot.)

To download a printer friendly version of the preceding chart, go here.

And Saturn?

The ringed planet – and yes, it’s rings are tilted to us now in such a way that they are again easy to see in a small telescope – is an early morning treat in December.  Although it rises just before midnight at the end of month, it’s not above the horizon until nearly 4 am at the outset. My advice – get up early – about two hours before sunrise. Our chart’s for that time at mid-month and at that time Saturn is well placed in the southeast for telescopic observation. It is one of the brightest “stars” in that section of the sky and easy to pick out with the naked eye.

Click image for larger version. Starry Nights Pro screen shot with annotations added.

For a printer-friendly version of the preceding chart, click here.

When I woke up, I immediately flipped open my antiquated  workstation from where I lay in bed. It sprang to life with renewed vigor, a needlessly complex reformatting was still treating the Z-140x as well as one would expect within the first week. All that mattered was that I could access a network again, and within seconds I was connecting to the Magnate family’s portal. Though Allan and Rikka’s terminals were silent, and Ploki was still asleep, his porti was downloading a large file, so there was a little latency in the sphere.

After sliding through the various social webs I keep a profile in, checking my multiple inboxes and even the dashboard control panel for this tlog, finding no new messages in each, I hovered purposelessly in the internet for a few moments, idly rapping my fingertips on the case of the computer. I’d hoped by then I would have at least received word back from Olympus Coast College about my application or student financial aid. Not knowing what else to do, I brought up a window from an interplanetary newsource, probably based on Earth. The stark headlines it launched at me in grim menacing boldface startled me at first.

– [FLU DEATH TOLLS IN THE UNITED TERRITORIES ESTIMATED AT 3,900] –

– [NEPTUNIAN PIRATES FAIL TO CAPTURE IONIAN CARGOSHIP SECOND TIME] –

– [TIPS TO SURVIVE BLACK FRIDAY AND SHOPPING BATTLEGROUNDS THIS HOLIDAY SEASON] –

Suddenly concerned for my health, and worried that all those months of not worrying weren’t going to pay off, I thumbed over the article. I truly detest the tricks these fear mongering, ad-savvy newsources use to optimize search results to generate some more hits each day. The report is contrary to the one just a couple of days ago which calculated deaths to be closer to 130, so I just figured they wanted to claim that all of the regular annual flu deaths had been attributed to the H1N1 virus. I closed the window before I could see how many of those confirmed deaths were on Mars, lest I become a victim of the pharmaceutical industry’s scare tactics.

The next window informed me pirates had been thwarted in their attempt to gain control of a ship leaving the orbit of Galatea. Either by coincidence or the attractiveness of the damn thing, it was the same ship hijacked last spring near those same waters. These marauders from the sixth moon of Neptune have reportedly captured over 50 vessels, and seemed to have a pretty good reputation until the Euxine Carolina was rescued by UT marines earlier this year. This time, the enhanced security placed onboard the hundred-ton spacefreighter was able to resolve any issue before it even developed into one.

I didn’t care about holiday bloodbaths or a house with a bunch of dead people in it. I couldn’t be compelled to look too deep into the stories reported by the Ganymedean newsource or an associated feed I’d brought up in the background while I digested these either. I really didn’t care about Earth’s prison camp or the election being gorked up on Ceres, or any of the other news they don‘t often openly address in Earth media. I’m usually enthralled with that sort of stuff.

I brought SpaceBook, my main social network, back into focus and updated my status to something disparaging to human nature for letting the media get so commercial, and closed my clunky old porti.

As if stirred by a ripple in a pond, Ploki Magnate rolled over in his bed. As he rested, he’d probably been able to sense so many similar, relatively tiny waves just and slept right through it. But a rock being thrown into the pond from so close may have felt like a surge against the barriers of his constant digital stream. He sat up, rubbing the side of is head.

“Oh, good morning, Ploki,” I said, realizing I hadn’t actually spoken a word to anyone when my voice cracked. The name already sounded a little strange to the tongue since it was a throwback to old hacker slang from days when a keyboard similar mine would still have been used. It was the handle that he chose to go by in all of his social avenues, virtual or not.

“Morning,” he said, not looking up from the glow of the button already alight in his hands. It illuminated his sharp face and the accentuated Ganymedean features. If he had antennae or pointy ears I would have seen them in the wash of blue light, but his head was framed only by a short haircut and a little scruff of beard.  “What’s this about the news?” he asked me, responding to the notification that woke him.

“Huh? Oh, well ther-” I began before he cut me off, he’d obviously brought up the headlines.

“Pirates…prison camp…experiment demonstrates possibility of life in Centauri?” he read aloud, a questioning tone as he wondered if he’d already heard that somewhere.

I was rising off my futon bed and walking as I replied. “I think that whole thing’s a ruse to get more scientific funding for exploration,” I grumbled as I stepped into the kitchen to scrounge up something.

“So it’s better we don’t find life outside the Solar system? You’re so cynical, Klay.” He was beginning to wake and warm up, getting out of bed only to settle into his computer chair.

I spoke to him over the kitchen counter, his workstation setup just on the other side. Anyone who used this kitchen couldn’t help but feel watched if he was seated there, though his eyes hardly rose from his screen. “No, I just think it’s going to be a huge bust if it turns out we went all the way there again and didn’t find anything … again,” there was little I came across in the fridge that screamed edible to me.

“Well it won’t be any bigger of a waste than if that money went to the defense budget,” his sleek porti connected to the portal the second he touched it, and in moments he was tangled in his various webs. “They got something like 700 bil for the military, just for a single year. That calculates to almost 2 billion a day.”

“Gork,” I exclaimed, slamming an unyielding cupboard. “Nothing’s looking appealing to me in here, wanna start the vaporizer?”

He glanced at the time and yelled “Fire it up!”

«←→»

Hunger was of the few things that could involuntarily force someone out into the big, scary world; and even then there are the options of fast food, take-out and delivery services to minimize a given human’s exposure to the outside as much as possible.

Ploki and I trod along the broad walkways of Newport’s Style Isle. Fashioned by The Caspian Company after a cookie-cutter Ionian Mission, it was a way to disguise their corporate headquarters as an outdoor shopping mall and gain a little extra revenue. It’s not actually an island, just a small mesa overlooking the Amazonian Ocean, and was used by natives in the past for their jamborees. Glancing back over my shoulder, I could see it twinkling like a thousand diamonds in the midday light, beyond the rows of fancy crawlers, oily parking spaces and pristine, artificial palm trees.

I used to work here. Tucked away in the digital media section of Style Isle’s outdated bookstore, I toiled the first year I lived on Mars. The commute to Newport from Fender was treacherous at the least, a whole 30 minutes. It was enough to make the job feel not worth it to me, spending the entirety of my only raise on the fuel it took just to get to work late every day.

We wove amongst the flow of shoppers, consisting mostly of wealthy women who didn’t need to be making any more money. It always felt a little strange, walking amongst the same people I used to serve, calmly passing them decked out in their most splendid weekday attire. From the hottest trends off the runways in Mihr Patera to soft velour sweat suits encrusted in rhinestones. Large embellished sunglasses, gaudy jewelry and any number of insanely eye-catching accessories glinted and dangled in the red sun.

Anything they could afford to distract or cover up the seams between cosmetic surgery and plastic treatments. Neck-tucks and antenna-removal scars can still be tricky to hide, and that’s where expensive bronze and ivory make-up assisted. They perfectly mimicked the exemplary mannequins, stiff in the windows beside them but so posh. I cringed to think what these reptiles would look like without any mods.

Just a few minutes there and I’d already seen  too many aged women showing off their new breasts and arms, many of which still needed some tightening and laser treatments to erase the damage of decades of sun exposure. Gray roots hid under platinum blonde, deep crows feet under cakes of eye shadow, and I’m sure I would have noticed the stench of death if it weren’t for the aroma of nail polish and hair products. I just wanted to find the cheapest place to grab a bite, then get the hell out of this commercial trap.

“I’m so excited for my appointment next week!” Ploki said, grinning ear to ear. “I’m going to get my license, and then my new toy will be completely legitimate,” there was so much glee behind his eyes as he said this.

“I just hopes it work’s out for you, it would suck if you were denied cause you didn’t qualify,” I pointed out, though that would be just as upsetting to all of us.

“Seriously,” he replied and winced with his blue eyes, tryinag not to imagine that possibility.

I turned to my Martian friend as we rounded a corner near the geyser fountain. “Hey, Ploki, can you look something up for me real quick?”

“Yeah, sure,” he said, slid his button out of his pocket and unlocked the palm-held device. The flat, blue screen lit up in broad daylight, appearing a few inches above his hand.  It rested on a faint laser cone, projected from the solitary LED eye; simplicity was the only identifying feature of an AM-3Gi button. He called up a search application, and looked at me, asking “What do you need?”

“Gork, that was fast. Don’t you still have to connect to a network with that thing?”

“No, I canceled that basic service that came with it.” He pointed to his temple with his free hand, saying “I’ve been auged.”

“Ahh, now it makes sense, you are your own sphere,” I looked at him again as if I’d be able to see it’s sheen around him now. “That’s astro, I’d love to get a chip one day,” I said quietly.

The cyborg’s eyes locked on me in disbelief. “What? You haven’t been auged?” the question rang loud here, even outside. Any sort of alterations, whether internal or external, are regarded highly by those of status, and I’m sure any of the women who could afford a boost in confidence could pay an extra few thousand to have a little silicon implanted in their heads, too.

I looked around at no scowling faces or judging eyes, surprisingly. “No, what makes you think I have?”

“I totally thought you were. You don’t have extra memory in there?” he asked, genuinely amazed I hadn’t undergone any sort of capacity upgrade.

“No, not at all,” I said with as little pride as I could show these technophilic Newpsies.

“Huh, I could have sworn. Hmm…well I guess you just have a good memory then,” he said, adjusting to the idea of my head being emptier than his.

“Thanks, I’ll take that as a compliment…especially coming from a machine,” I said facetiously.

He protested “Hey, I’m still mostly human!”

“Whatevs, Robot. Find me the cheapest food around,” I commanded.

He grumbled, and returned his gaze to the screen, manipulating the flattened beam that the browser was illustrated upon with the swish of his fingertips. He looked up, over to the other side of the food court we had just meandered into. “There. The pizza place has the lowest cost here,” he said at once.

“Wow, you found it that quick?” I said, astounded by his technology again.

“No, I just remembered,” he said with a grin, adding “Gorker.”

After we finished our two-dollar slices of pizza pie, and made our way back through the mess of grotesque human facsimiles, we found ourselves at his little, cerulean crawler. The two-door hatchback always reminded me of my elusive vehicle, though his wasn’t built on Ganymede.

His Saturnian-made Polaris was probably of a finer construction than my rodent. The interior had been optimized for comfort and visibility, so much so that even the HUD cowling had been displaced to the center of the dashboard, creating more storage areas.

At the press of the ignition switch, the engine whined and instruments illuminated with bright blue light, similar to the glow of the Ploki’s button, which now rested in a crèche on the center console. It supplied music from it’s harddrive to the entertainment system, and the driver or passenger could easily control media with the interface on either end.

We hurried home, where Allan waited for our return. He’d sequestered himself into his room, determined to make full use of his burgeoning class-load by doing everything he could to pass them all. Little had been seen of him, except when he needed transit to and from campus, or when there was a bi-weekly jam, or if Nymh had come over to lure him out, though she just as often did nothing to make him want to leave the room.

Similar could be said of the youngest of the Magnate siblings. Rikka was often out of the house since she was usually working one of her two jobs, and only appeared in sharp, semi-formal outfits when she was home from either, or on her way to an interview for a third. Attention seeking and a hypochondriac, she was currently fighting a bout with the deadly flu upstairs in her quarters, and no one could tell if she were actually sick or not.

I’d become good friends with Ploki over the previous weeks, finding similar interests was easy for us; or something like that. It could have been something to do with being the same age as me, or that he was easier to tolerate for an entire day than his often boisterous older brother. Perhaps it was because we had planned to move to that ski resort in Cyane this winter and had begun pre-roommate rituals of bonding. But it’s probably just because we both share the ground level of the house, he and I sleeping in the living room and family room, respectively.

We arrived back at his house in the mid-afternoon and immediately return to our positions in front of our workstations. Using some sort of control on his terminal, he remotely activated his brand new vaporizer, allowing it to warm up the 600 seconds so it will work properly. He then sent a message through the sphere to let Allan know he’d have about ten minutes to find a stopping point.

By force of habit, I brought up the newsources again with my renewed net connection, feeling warm with this novelty: the privilege of fresh information afforded only to those who have the technological means. By the look of the new banners, it seems healthcare reforms were stagnated by both sides of UT government, Earth’s new president visited Titan, and strife continued between warring factions on little Davidia.

A terrorist plot on another Earth skyscraper was foiled, a fusion plant in New Ganymede almost meltdown again and AM would probably release a new model of the button over the holidays. Students protested an increase in tuition rates at University of Mars campuses, a ferry crash in The Rings left 26 dead and the sequel to that stupid teenage-heartthrob-vampire movie broke box office records this weekend.

I closed all the windows at once and brought up one of my bookmarked links: a streaming, real-time image of the star Sol. I zoomed in partway, only until I spotted the well recognizable shapes of the gas giants, the thin haze of asteroid belts and the glint off the terrestrial worlds orbiting close the yellow main-sequence star. If it weren’t for a ticker running the time at the bottom you would have sworn it was just a still image, captured by a traveler from some rocket’s window.

I attempted to imagine for a moment that I was peering out of that porthole at the static but majestic view. I tried to picture myself away from any apprehensions of holidays, pirates, finances or vaccinations. It wasn’t working.

I collapsed the screen of the outdated porti. “Hey Ploki,” I called as I stood up, “I’m getting Allan whether that machine of yours is ready or not.”

]]> http://alcuin9.wordpress.com/2009/11/24/more-thoughts-on-neptune/ Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:28:19 +0000 alcuin9 http://alcuin9.wordpress.com/2009/11/24/more-thoughts-on-neptune/

I have been having some interesting conversations via email recently with astrology blogger extraordinare Neeti Ray, keeper of the flame on Astrology Expressed. Our conversations were prompted by some recent postings on Neptune on my part and some comments and attitudes regarding Neptune and relationships on her site. She very kindly asked if she could use some of my thoughts on Neptune and love as a guest blog on her site. If you’re interested, please visit Astrology Expressed. It’s a wonderful blog, and Neeti has a very fresh and honest viewpoint about living with and learning astrology.

Jupiter the giant ruler of Sagittarius

This year the heavy burden of change in earth’s systems, world governments and weather patterns is sometimes laid at Scorpio’s door. But a much greater force was at work: Saturn, the great planet of sidereal change, slowly and inexorably moved out of the communicative and meticulously-ordered earth-sign of Virgo, where he has ruled, written in stone, made careful lists and acted in a predictable manner for the last three years. On October 29th 2009, he entered Libra, the zodiac sign of partnerships, cooperative ventures, balance and – above all – change.

Changes at the end of the year are expected as we in the Northern hemisphere descend into winter; but Saturn’s influence is huge. Just as the moon affects earth’s ocean tides, the ringed giant’s great orb reaches from its distant position in the sixth solar orbit to touch and move this little world of ours in the third planetary belt round the sun.

At the beginning of November this huge astrological catalyst of change had already joined forces with the sun in Scorpio and world mayhem, freak weather systems, and cultural upheaval were apparent: floods, tsunamis and out-of-season storms added to wars and conflict, famine and a breakdown in communications in both Old and New worlds. We are only now recovering from the effects of drought and starvation in some African regions and deluge and homeless scenarios in the North.

Saturn the planet of change and upheaval

It is a surprise and relief when, following the double Scorpionic portion dished out to us in mid-November by the New Moon, that Saturn’s new position in Libra should be accentuated by the sun’s transition on November 22nd into jovial Sagittarius. This zodiac sign is ruled by abundant Jupiter. It allows us a respite, a time to remember our place on the planet, our blessings, our way forward. But it, too, heralds change.

Sagittarius is a fire sign, sent to melt the icy waters Scorpio dragged in with its lethal tail. The archer, sunny of disposition and sending arrows presaging abundant flow to come, allows the glow of Thanksgiving and a glimpse towards the festivities of midwinter, but he reminds us that more work is round the corner as we are moving into a New Age. It helps to know, however that his ruler, Jupiter presently stands with Neptune, the planet of change and the spiritual, the mystical and unknown in forward-looking Aquarius; so our path, while difficult, is overseen by angels.

A trusted astrologer friend says:
“November 22-30: This is a highly creative time. Pay attention and focus on the little signs. Push the boundaries of what you perceive possible. Stretch your imagination. Resist the temptations of the status quo. Ask the right questions, ‘why not’ and ‘what if’. Be brave.

“Mostly just be in your own spirit, take time to meditate, try to remember that the Universe is ordering things in right timing; that in moving from a place of trusting, your own ability and power to create will open up. Spend time with others you like to be around and keep cutting clutter and non-essentials from your life.”

As the month draws to a close, we are being challenged to seek even greater clarity and depth of meaning in life, in our relationships, in our day-to-day interaction with others, work colleagues, family and strangers alike, so that we start to evolve in spiritual understanding of our place on this special planet Earth.

And at month-end, as we move into December, Mercury aspects challenge us to release stress and restore clarity of thinking. Mercury the messenger and communicator-par-excellence may get us through the hard part.

December begins with a powerful double-whammy: a Full Moon in Gemini on December 1st coincides with giant Uranus’ turning direct.

Changes and new directions are on the cards – in spades.

But we have help. Angels and giants are around to help us through.

This is an occasional astrological blog posting, as we move through the year. I am aware that many are familiar with the Western zodiac and its implications. However I hope to encourage a friend who understands the ramifications of the Vedic astrological system of the Indian sub-continent to join me in the next blog post. It is a fascinating system, with many parallels with Western and even Chinese texts. I think it will be something to look forward to.

I’m a regular reader of Dawn Bodrogi’s blog The Inner Wheel. Her work is awe-inspiring, not only because of its depth and attention to detail, but because she approaches it with great seriousness. She’s been kind enough to let me pick her brains and, recently, we were talking about Neptune, love and relationships. I want to share some of that conversation here because what she said goes a long way in dispelling the “bad guy” reputation that Neptune has acquired.  So, with Dawn’s permission, let’s turn the spotlight on Neptune and the soul-longing for love that infuses his children.

One of the reasons I specialize in synastry is that relationships are the fast track to spiritual development (and even ordinary old common sense, when it comes down to it).  We often learn more of the soul’s desire from being in relationship than we would in ten or twenty times the same space in ordinary ‘life’ experience. The state of love itself is a spiritual state, in all of its manifestations.  The ability to experience love is both a gift, and a power.  Sometimes, we give our power over to another, and sometimes we wield it, and learning about all that is part of the trial.

We often long for completion, yet we are not incomplete.  However, there is something lacking in us, a cry for wholeness, which nags at us eternally.  It is something inherent in us, the result of the separation from the Source which is physical manifestation.  No human being  born can complete us. However, we are born with the need to have certain experiences that expand our conscious awareness.  Astrology tells us so much about this.  Other people fit into our patterns of lack–perhaps connecting with us from other lives, perhaps not–and they help us learn what we’re here to learn, to know what we’ve come here to know.  These people, these loves, appear to be the missing key to what is needed.  Unfortunately, a lot of people mistake this for fate, for destiny, as if there is no choice, and I don’t blame them, because it feels like it.  Some one or some thing has brought us exactly what we need, at the right place, at the right time.  Why?  Beats me.  For me, it’s one of the great mysteries.  It’s one of the things that has convinced me that not only is the universe intelligent, but, in its own perverse way,  it is kind and generous.

If there was more proper synastric astrology about, people wouldn’t get into these delusions about one everlasting partnership.  Or they might, but at least they would be forewarned.  It’s one of the goals of my site, to wisen people up about the meaning of relationships.  There’s too much negative Neptune about–we’re still experiencing the fallout from the so-called ‘Romantic’ period (when Neptune was discovered) and the fallout from the Medieval period, when courtly love (i.e. longing for the unattainable) was the order of the day.  I think there are more and more of us who are experiencing other ways that Neptune weaves us together, no less powerful or passionate, no less profound, but more purposeful, less delusional. Sometimes I think that our ideas about what relationships should be are 600 years out of date.

It drives me crazy when people start categorizing states or stages of love, as if there is some kind of ladder of love we need to climb.  I don’t think it works like that.  Love is so varied, so multi-planed, so infinite, that I don’t believe the human mind or heart can grasp its reaches, let alone give us some kind of twelve step plan to a twin flame existence (God, I hate that term, twin flame, don’t you?  It’s like something someone would read on a Hallmark card.). There are even some otherwise very good astrologers out there who think they have it all figured out–which just tells me very loudly that they don’t know what they’re talking about.

I don’t agree that soul connections are about unresolved issues between people.  Sometimes they are.  But that’s far too mundane an explanation.  Sometimes, a lot of times, they’re about healing.  We can help one another heal. Sometimes they’re about pure joy.  Sometimes they’re about taking responsibility.  Sometimes people are here for us to simply help us through, or to learn.  Those aren’t issues.  And yes, I have to say it, sometimes they’re about giving unconditionally.  But the giving that we do in those circumstances is never painful, and doesn’t leave us lacking.  It brings us more joy.  It makes us stronger.  And it teaches us how and when to let go, that when we let go, we don’t lose love, we live it.  It becomes a part of us.

There is a mistaken notion that people who love are always on the same level of loving.  It isn’t always an equal playing field.  This is where we get into difficult territory, because we can be intensely in love with people who are not up to our level of loving, and cannot reciprocate.  However, where real love is concerned, there is always a kindness and an understanding that allows us to let go. 

The notion of ‘forever after’ in love is rather strange to me, because for me, the love we feel for others is always forever, embedded within us.  If the love is genuine, we will pick up where we left off.  In particular, intense sexual loves carry the deepest imprint. There is a belief in Tantric Buddhism that every time we make love to a person, we create a little ‘ghost,’ an echo, a psychic imprint that will reverberate through time.  What we often don’t realize, and what I hope we are opening towards, is that these seemingly ‘extraordinary’ experiences of love are everyday, common experiences.  The world is not put together in the way we have been taught.  And we need to be more careful about where we put our energy.

It’s human nature to want to cling.  Deep down, we know our lives here are ephemeral, and we fear it.  Our reaction to our human brevity is to long for ‘forever’ types of love. For one love that will never alter, never abandon.  Yet in real terms, each love is defined by the participants, and each love is unique, with its own purpose and history.  Some of  our loves will develop side by side.  For others, we will play ‘give and take’ throughout lifetimes. But in truth, we are obsessed with love because the experience of loving is one of the few in life that allows us to experience our own immortality.  When we are in love, we are at one with the movement of the universe. We are past, present and future all in one. No boundaries can contain us, there is nothing we can’t achieve.  If we had more of a sense of how we could use this power, we would advance so much, so far.

As I’ve said to you, Neptune and I are old friends.  My experiences of him have run the gamut, from the typical longing for the ‘unattainable’ in my youth to, well, the strange and intense and awe-inspiring new experiences of love that keep coming along.  If we’re open to love, it is never finished. It grows stronger and wiser and more flexible and more sure.  The kind of power that love wields, the power of awakening and understanding and healing, is alive and running through all of us, all of the time, if only we would stop being distracted by temporal things.  If only we could tap into it on a regular basis, instead of focusing on the silly bits, think how far we could go…

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Dawn Bodrogi has studied astrology since the age of twelve, and has been a practicing astrologer for over twenty years with a special emphasis on synastry. Her studies in Jungian psychology, alchemy, and Buddhist philosophy inform her work. Her upcoming book, The Inner Wheel, takes a new look at interpreting secondary progressions. You can see more of Dawn’s work at her blog, The Inner Wheel: Living with Astrology.
 

Thunderbolts are go!

Today I would like to look in some detail at the various dynamics of the relating planets – Venus and Mars – in their applications to Neptune. Whilst not nearly as abrasively uncomfortable as Venus and Mars to Pluto connections, this blend does create its own unique difficulty and with understanding, there is certainly enormous potential for progress.

I could of course talk in the abstract about these energies, but it would be better in my view to use the example of Venus Williams, the American tennis sensation who has won, with her sister, every major title and honour in the sport. Let us begin by looking at her chart for reference:

Venus Williams: 17 June 1980, 14:12 (+7:00) Lynwood CA, USA

Of course, what can be seen right away is the enormous number of correlations to her sister Serena: here are just a few:

• Vesta (at one level, the sister) is on the Aries Point, thus public projection and prominence are the result in relation to the female sibling.
• The only real connection that Vesta makes though – at a subjective level – is its conjunction to Sun, thus the father is the common ground, and pretty much the only common ground.
• The asteroid Isis (42) is exactly conjunct the Midheaven: a career configured with a sibling, (Isis also relates to sibling relationships), and with the sign Cancer there is tenacity and loyalty here, but crucially, the conjunction is squared by Icarus (1566), and this is a square from Isis to Icarus of only 7 minutes of arc, so there is astonishing adrenaline-producing tension between them; a big part of her drive to the top is based upon her need to beat her sister, to be faster, better, in Icarus’ terms, to fly higher!
• Mercury is at the apex of a tee-square from Pluto opposition Pallas. If we take Mercury to signify sibling relationships, what we have here is in fact sibling rivalry, Pallas speaks of behaviours and strategies that are developed to please others, and learned (most especially in a female nativity) through the daughter role; thus pleasing father is the key. Imagine how that feels when opposed by Pluto; it’s not going to be comfortable; there’s a real desperate, gun-to-the-head quality at work here, must be what father wants, and that tension gets channelled into Mercury, into the sibling dynamic. Note how Pluto is ruled by Venus and Pallas by Mars, and these planets are square to each other and both in hard aspect to Neptune, there’s essentially a competition here based on a need to be more attractive than the sibling, to be more lovable, to be preferable to father. This is echoed by a conjunction of the asteroid Lilith (1181) to Pluto, selection or favouritism, being the chosen one is a life or death issue.

The ultimate sibling rivalry, Venus as runner-up...

Now let’s consider, in this context, the tee-square of Mars, Venus and Neptune. Mars is the focus of the tee-square from Venus opposition Neptune and is therefore squared by both and importantly ruled by Mercury, echoing the key motivator in the pattern, being more attractive to father than the sibling. Confusing messages about sexuality would have begun here, love would have begun to unravel as a concept, and very early on this would have been a feature of the family dynamic. All the groundwork for later psychological imprints is done between the ages of 3 and 5 when the hard aspects of Mars to Venus/Neptune and Pluto to Pallas are perfected by Solar Arc, these early childhood years are formative in terms of the sibling dynamic and an awareness of what it means to compete for and win father’s attention begins to make itself felt. In any case, Neptune configured with the Venus-Mars square is profoundly significant, and this is the timing that we can isolate through Solar Arc measurement. We can project these timings forward and look for applications to angles to determine major transition points in relation to these early dynamics. We note the following:

Lifetime Solar Arc directions to As/Mc

1999 was Venus’ breakthrough year, and it marked a period when both herself and her sister Serena were in the zenith of their sport, Venus was ranked in the world’s top 3 for the first time and she faced her sister in a major final for the first time too. The sibling rivalry dynamic was lit up by the Sun’s presence at the zenith of the chart, and with Sun in Gemini, ruling Mercury therefore, it was inevitable that her sister would be configured.

Moving ahead to 2003, the Venusian quality is illuminated by the Arc to the Midheaven. The date here is 5th August and exactly 40 days later, her sister Yetunde Price was murdered by mistake (Venus is opposed to Neptune) in a drug-related drive-by shooting (squared to Mars which is profoundly conjunct Zeus, which rules firearms) near the tennis courts where the sisters used to practise when younger. Note too that Yetunde was a half-sister, and half-siblings are very often a feature of hard Mercury-Pluto contacts. 2004 was inevitably a hard year, Venus lost much of her previous form and struggled to make her usual impact in part because of a persistent abdominal injury which first troubled her at the time of her sister’s shooting. Note then that Mars (violence) conjunct Zeus (firearms) falls at 17 Virgo, the degree that corresponds to the abdominal muscles.

What we glean from the general tone and dynamic of the nativity is that this tee-square is profoundly powerful, most especially when it is activated by Solar Arc in this way. Let us try to understand the energy at work here, because these planetary relationships do manifest in very specific ways. When we understand and recognise these patterns we begin to be released from their unconscious directives.

The theory of tee-squares is very simple. The opposition creates a pattern of dissatisfaction, inability to find peace because of contrary drives, and the tension this creates is expressed through the apex planet; it fuels the apex point, and in the nature of the square aspect is a tense, driven, challenging and experientially uncomfortable force; it is the channel through which the internal tension is cathartised. Thus, when we understand the opposition, we can begin to speculate as to the motive force behind the external expression of drive.

So, Venus opposition Neptune. We can tell right away that there is a problem balancing (opposition) the themes of love (Venus) and reality (Neptune); in a nutshell it describes a condition whereby the experience of love never quite matches up to the ideal. There is a longing and a yearning – at a very deep level – for perfect romantic union, and the usual pattern for the individual with this aspect is to fall in love very quickly, and for a time everything is perfect, wonderful, a transport of the most exalted kind; the new partner is delightful in every way, it is a rapture, a deep and rapturous soul-union and all is well with the world. Neptune creates enormously high expectations, indeed, it creates impossible expectations, and this is the mechanism by which the innate spirituality of the planet is awakened, regardless of what planets it contacts. The expectations of impersonal Neptune are designed to be so perfect that they have to be beyond the reach of any mere mortal being, so the inevitable conclusion is disappointment (another profoundly Neptunian theme), and with time and repeated episodes of disillusionment in relation to the contacting archetype (in this case Venus, thus romantic disappointment), the transcending process is awakened. The soul learns that no other human can fulfill the dreamy expectations of Neptune, so the love nature begins to focus on transcendent objects of love, the divine, the spiritual, a love of humanity; impersonal love is awakened, the soul begins to focus on spiritual rather than personal desires and themes. Neptune uses divine discontent to fuel the journey toward transcendence.

Mundanely, the pattern is nearly always identical; I call this the ‘One Who Got Away’ Syndrome. Usually, there was a figure from the past with whom the individual didn’t quite consummate a relationship. There may have been a brief fling, or even no fling at all, just a desire for one, but crucially, the relationship never progressed beyond the first rapturous days and weeks of divine contentment. The relationship may have lasted long enough to have been in some way meaningful, but never so long for the mundane and unpleasant realities to impinge upon Neptune’s awareness. The personal hygiene issues and tendency to be a real grump on Monday mornings never quite registered, so the relationship still holds the promise of perfection, even after it is over. Often the reason that the relationship ended is considered to be in some way tragic, as befits Neptune, perhaps they were forced apart by external circumstances and loss and sorrow are bound up in the story, but crucially, it is important to recognise that had the relationship managed to progress, then it would inevitably have fallen into the disappointment trap: because that is what Neptune does.

Now we should consider in this exact context the fact that Mars also squares Neptune. You can put this together yourself, because as the other major component of relationship, Mars concerns itself with sexual (as opposed to romantic) love and this then is also pushed to be the focus of the Neptunian disappointment trap. Typically, Mars – Neptune has very vivid sexual fantasizes that – again – cannot be satisfied by mundane reality and so sex becomes a disappointment too. The wish is to be transported into a state of sexual Nirvana, but it cannot happen, the woman with this aspect especially tends to project it onto the man in her life, his sexual performance doesn’t therefore match up: it is always disappointing. The man is of course perfectly aware of this (albeit at an unconscious level) and this is why he often takes refuge from the self-doubt that is engendered by the projection in Neptunian themes, alcohol, drugs, pornography and illicit affairs. Deception becomes a key component of the projected dynamic. It is astoundingly common for Mars – Neptune women to discover that their husband has been having an affair behind their back, often for many years! The dynamic is quite compelling, knowing (deep-down) that he can never satisfy his wife’s sexual needs, he protects himself from emasculation and ego-collapse by finding somebody whose sexual needs he can satisfy. He is not ostensibly being unfaithful even, or at least that was never his objective, it is invariably an act of self-defence (although understandably it is extremely difficult for the deceived partner to see it this way).

Finally, Venus squares Mars, and here there is no transcendent conundrum, this is simply an inability to reconcile love and sex, the two feel uncomfortable because there is a competition dynamic at play where love is concerned. Love (Venus) becomes confused with winning (Mars), indeed, all Venusian themes are given dynamic tension through the competitive, physical, go-getting drive of Mars. This dynamic again plays out in Venus Williams’ nativity: with Venus in Gemini (siblings), there is a competitive edge to the need to be loved. Competing for love, might be the watchword of this aspect, and remember that this square rule the Pallas-Pluto/Lilith opposition, which says “if I’m not father’s favourite, then I’ll die”. It was her father who pushed the sister’s to become tennis players and his ruthless determination that they be the best that has provided much of the energy for their astonishing rise to prominence.

There is so much more of interest here (if I had the time I’d write it all out), but suffice to say:

• Consider how the tee-square expresses. Mars is in Virgo, so power is combined with precision. Ed Moses had Cazimi Venus conjunct Mars in Virgo, perfect precision of movement, economy of movement, here force is applied with skill.
• Then Mars is in an absolutely partile conjunction (10 minutes!) with Zeus, the Transneptunian associated with firearms and sports! (Archie Griffin has a Cazimi Zeus!) Zeus threw thunderbolts right? Venus Williams has the fastest serve in women’s tennis:
  

  [From Wikipedia] She holds the record for the fastest serve struck by a woman in a main draw event. At the Zurich Open, she recorded 130 mph (210 km/h). She also holds the record for fastest serve in all four Grand Slam tournaments: 2003 Australian Open quarterfinal – 125 mph (201 km/h), 2007 French Open second round, 2008 Wimbledon final, 2007 US Open first round – 129 mph.At Wimbledon in 2008, her average first serve speed was 115 mph (185 km/h) in the quarterfinal, 116 mph (187 km/h) in the semifinal, and 111 mph (179 km/h) in the final. She also had a higher average serving speed than then World No.1 Roger Federer as well as eventual men’s champion Rafael Nadal.

• Mars is at the halfsum of Uranus and the Midheaven, so unusual authority, career individuation is realised through precision and power (and throwing thunderbolts).
• Venus’ boyfriend Hank Kuehne has (wait for it) Zeus conjunct Sun, with Sun at 18° of Virgo, mere minutes from Venus’ Mars/Zeus conjunction. It’s impossible without knowing his birth time to say how exact this might be, certainly it’s within a few minutes at most. That’s one relationship that was certainly written in the stars!

That’s plenty for this article, please bear in mind that I can apply this same insight (and much greater detail) to your own nativity, so please check Astrology Hour if you would like more information.