Commercial fishing boats at Montauk Harbor. Photo by Eric Francis
Note to readers: On Tuesday, I sent a letter to Planet Waves subscribers, sharing my thoughts about Neptune in Aquarius (which ends Friday after 14 years). You may read it here. I received many replies, including one from one of my astrology guitar heros, Dale O’Brien. Dale has been one of the pioneering — and most innovative — writers about Chiron, going almost back to the beginning. Here is his letter. –efc
Dear Eric:
Hopefully Planet Waves Readers appreciate your thoughtful perspectives on astrology. For example, while most astrologers are constantly speculating on upcoming astrological placements, how can we ever learn about the accuracy and/or relevance of such theoretical astrology if we don’t look back to what happened during a planet’s transit, especially a very recent transit? Thank you for being a most welcome exception! It seems that almost no one fact-checks astrological prediction, perhaps because it would be simply too embarrassing.
Looking back on the cliché-laden prognostications made in the late 1990s about what Neptune in Aquarius was supposed to be, it turns out that things didn’t come about as expected. I like what you said, Eric, about understanding Neptune transits better after they have already happened. Your recent looking-back perspectives on Neptune in Aquarius were insightful. I would now like to respond to your open request for comments on this recent transit.
Neptune in Aquarius: A God A Long Way from Home
It seems highly improbable that the ancients looked up at the night sky, tracked a planet for a while, and then tagged it with a bunch of keywords. Imagine one of the most important Gods of Ancient Greece, or Ancient Rome, with a posit-it note stuck over his duct-taped mouth, a note with abstract concept words.
Carl Jung said that the Gods come to modern man in the form of diseases. Maybe they “get” to us in that way, because we really do not “get” them — “see” them, hear them out, understand them, respect them. The ancient Greeks saw human presumptuous self-importance and disrespect for any God as Hubris, the most stupid and most dangerous mistake that a person or a people could ever make. For example, Venus can bring Venereal disease to an individual disrespectful of the Goddess of Love. However, mythology tells us that even an entire people can undergo unpleasant suffering for collective hubris. It might behoove us to try and get to know these Gods, one by one, and what each must be going through. We can do this easily enough by knowing at least something of the mythic story of each God. What they are “going through”, one by one, are the signs of the Zodiac and various encounters (aspects) with other Gods.
Said partially and briefly, mythic Neptune was/is the Lord of the Waters. Planets (including Neptune) are wanderers, spending much more time traveling than being at home. As with any traveler, He or She will find some places more enjoyable to travel through than other places. Astro-logically, mytho-logically, Neptune is happiest in Water signs and most at home in Pisces. He is also made welcome in his brother Jupiter’s Sagittarian realm.
However, the WORST place for Neptune to go through is Aquarius, for a variety of reasons. First, the Titan Chronos (Saturn) hates the three brothers Hades (Pluto), Zeus (Jupiter), and Poseidon (Neptune). Saturn rules Capricorn and traditionally rules Aquarius. Having to go through Capricorn was bad enough for Neptune, but Aquarius is a Fixed sign, predisposed to being in control of others. This was going to be an awful 14 years for Neptune here.
Have you ever traveled to a state or a country where they hate your kind? Order you around? Neptune first suffered through Saturn-ruled Capricorn, beginning under the mandate rule of Ronald Reagan in his second term. As if that wasn’t bad enough, then he had to go through Aquarius.
Worse, Titan Prometheus-the-Thief (astrological Uranus) had already broken into Aquarius (Uranus ingress approximately coinciding with the beginning of cranky-discontents’ FOX News shock radio). Neptune was controlled here, and was used to control others.
Just as Neptune is better understood as “who”, not “what”, Aquarius is better understood as “when” (in the year) not what. Our popular “Western” astrology is based on the seasons of the year defined by the movement of the Sun. The sign of Aquarius is the sign of the middle of winter. The Fixed or controlled “Air” was within a “structure” (a building) with air in contrast to the outside air. Inside air can be warm and dry, outside cold and wet. Those people inside breathe that air together. The word “conspire” means “to breathe together.” Aquarius, then, indicates the issue of insiders and outsiders, internal conspiracy and/or outsider conspiracy. Generally speaking, “Outsider” Aquarians want to break in; “Insider” Aquarians are conservative of what they have.
Having entered a modern technological era, Aquarius not only “rules” heating and “Air-conditioning,” but the Air Force and Air Power (note the Fixed/controlling nature), as well as the “Air Waves” of radio, television, internet, wireless phones, HAARP, etc. Neptune here is forced to make indoor pollution, a belief issue involving climate change, toxic “Chem trails” in the sky, mind control Fox TV News begins under Neptune in Aquarius, the most popular source of “news” in the U.S. for the past ten years. Probably the most memorable part of Neptune in Aquarius was when the world watched “Air” planes purportedly stolen by outsiders who then took the planes “inside” buildings. Insiders jumped out of usually closed windows, outsider rescue and fire teams became insiders, and then the same buildings seemingly vanished from the air, filling the air with toxic debris.
Neptune phenomena are believed in or not believed in, starting with Neptune himself, or his horses said to be seen charging as waves towards the shore, as seen in dream, daydream, photography and painting. Are they there or not there? Similarly, Neptune in Aquarius was full of phenomena believed in or not believed in.
Besides the issues of belief in whatever collective issues mentioned here, or otherwise recalled relevant to this era, there also seems to have been a belief issue regarding astrology. Question: do you really believe that any or all of the “astrology” made up “out of the air” of modern mental abstraction is true, real, and accurate? Do you disbelieve in the astrological relevancy of the mythic stories of the Gods and Goddesses who share the same names as our Planets?
Do you believe that traditional planetary rulerships don’t matter? That the seasonal Nature of the signs of the Zodiac does not matter? Do you believe that the ubiquity of astrological clichés on the Internet proves them to be true?
Be all that as it may be, or not be. Now, finally, Neptune so long in Aquarius, where he has been so near, and yet so far from home, is truly coming down from the sky, is coming home to the familiar waters of Pisces. Chiron waits just inside to greet him.
Blessed Be!
Dale O’Brien
