Romantic Relationship

 

March 11, 2005

 

http://cainer.com/ericfrancis/mar11.html

 

Dear Eric:

 

I was born on June 4, 1942 at 12 noon in the town of Grimsby, Ontario, Canada. I am as you can see in the transition period between middle age and the final chapter. The past several years have been difficult.

 

The welcome end of an overly long marriage was not without its problems. Now I am going through a period of adjustment after the unwelcome end of a two and a half year relationship. Throw in a health mystery and subsequent employment/financial spices just for good measure. I've been very successful as a parent and in my career, but I have never had a successful 'romantic' relationship. I've noted that recently here in Canada this has become a big issue. I expect it has something to do with witnessing our parents' stay-together-come-hell-or-highwater marriages and finding that this model just doesn't work for us, or often for them. It might also be a result of marriages starting out in one social climate but being lived in another.

 

But I, like millions of others, really want a partner to share life with. It appears that most of the questions I see on your site are from younger people, but I feel just as lost and confused and fearful now as I did at 19. This is both surprising and disappointing. Life has thrown me some curves just as I'm losing mine, and it unnerves me to find myself in this position of lost confidence. My question is where do I go from here and how do I get there? And is there any there? When you are young there seems to be so much time to get it right.

 

None the Wiser

 

 

Dear NTW,

 

Isn't it interesting that the most common feeling on our planet is loneliness, and the most abundant thing is people? Do you ever wonder what's going on with that?

 

There's something in your chart that suggests to me that the old models of relationship no longer work. There is something in society that also suggests the old models of relationship no longer work -- but that something shows up very personally for you. You are someone who needs to blend a need for emotional freedom with a rather strong drive to bond. So you have this interesting mix in your psyche, and for you, the need for both bonding and freedom are undeniable. By freedom I am talking about emotional freedom, but you also need a lot of social freedom -- you need your friends and the people you look up to, and you need someone who these other people in your life do not threaten.

 

You are, in a sense, a person of the future, floating around on an island of the past. It is more than interesting how much the world has changed in the past century, and still most of society's institutions are still attempting to enforce the same model of compulsory heterosexual marriage (I'll call it CHM for short) as the one and only true way of life. Even assuming that CHMs were indeed the most virtuous thing there is, our society is for the most part no longer made of the same extended families, neighborhoods, and communities that would have, in the past, supported relationships and households.

 

So these relationships, when they happen, often have a high-and-dry feeling, because they are not well integrated into the larger experience of life. This is a big deal because humans are tribal animals, not solitary ones. Yet we tend to ignore this and see our primary relationships as molecules that float around having little to do with the larger lives we live, or the lives that we need. The relationship model we are taught tends to deny affection, love and support from 'outside' the relationship, we are taught to be threatened by these things. Often the relationship is seen as a retreat from one's usual activities with peers. And that is a truly unstable situation, as is proven by divorce statistics, which have increased substantially since the 1970s. This is not good for us, or our kids.

 

Assuming a noon birth, as you've suggested, your chart tells an interesting story where relationships are concerned. The ruling planet of your ascendant (Mercury, as you are Virgo rising) and the ruling planet of your descendent (7th house or partnership angle, Jupiter, as you are Pisces there) are in a conjunction. But Mercury is retrograde and Jupiter is not, so the two are pulling away from one another. Alternately, if we use Neptune as the ruler of Pisces, Mercury is square Neptune -- an equally challenging situation.

 

It seems to me that what you are set up for is a lifetime of learning scrupulous honesty in your relationships. If you are seeking a partner, I suggest you consider the field of possibilities to be all those with whom you can be truly honest about who you are and what you need. This statement runs rather contrary to what we're generally taught -- don't be yourself; don't reveal who you are.

 

To get to know ourselves means casting off the many layers of denial we are taught by our parents, church and other 'social' institutions. You have a rather unique way of feeling, and while we could say this about anyone, you are truly an individualist and you really need to come from an unusual depth of self-understanding in order to relate to another person. You have many, many planets in Gemini as well, so this means you need to get to know yourself from several perspectives and know all the facets of yourself well.

 

Then, from there, I think you'll be able to invent a relationship form that you can live with, but that is truly unique to you. Remember the extent to which you are turned on by intelligence, but also need sensuality. Remember; don't forget.