Mercury is Direct

 

April 15, 2005

 

http://cainer.com/ericfrancis/apr15.html

 

Was that a long Mercury retrograde, was it particularly difficult, or was it just weird in a super interesting way? It began at the Spring Equinox about three weeks ago, it ended the morning of the 12th (that was Tuesday) and was accompanied by a solar eclipse last week, which happened the day of Pope John Paul II's funeral -- perhaps the most massive ever in the world. These mystical rites seemed to transcend time, merging the Druid times, the Medieval era and the modern world of television and international events. Between the astrology and the associated news events, life seemed to take on the shapes and tones of a Salvador Dali painting.

 

Events like the pope dying often fall around eclipses of the Sun, and eclipses also bring clusters of events that gather a lot of public attention. It's fairly easy to predict, actually, it's just difficult to say quite what you're predicting. In this case the cluster included Terry Schiavo, Prince Rainier and then the pope, with the prince deserving a lot more attention than he got. What we can note from this is that people often tend to find common cause or join together for death more readily than life. There are no comparable wordwide celebrations. Even the royal wedding was haunted by the 'ghost of Diana' (mainly because the media won't leave her alone). If you ask me this is obsession with the dark side the result of deep confusion, which I would rate as both spiritual and biological, to the extent that the two can be thought of as different.

 

If I may, here is a bold statement. We live in a world where death has more credibility than life. This is why something erotic is considered taboo and something morbid is considered perfectly normal. There is really no way to stop this on a cultural level; but as individuals, we can each make a decision to honor the life, love and passion within ourselves, and let that stand as true and good. Yes, it takes bravery. Yes, people will say you'll 'get hurt' if you love, express your passion, or make decisions that honor what you really want out of life.

 

But what is the alternative?

 

These days we are in the stranger than fiction experience of Mars conjunct Neptune, which is stirring the imagination, firing up the delusions of certain people in certain quarters, and casting further confusion on the nature of truth and lies. Yet this aspect also comes with a sense of raging idealism, combining Aquarius, fiery Mars and deeply sensitive Neptune. This aspect has been exact all day Wednesday and Thursday and will continue to be rather close Friday and into the weekend. (It's located in the 18th degree of Aquarius. Each of the 360 degrees of the wheel has a visual symbol associated with it, called the Sabian Symbols. The Sabian for 18 Aquarius is: 'A man's secret motives are being publicly unmasked'. This speaks to the challenges of privacy and secrecy in our electronic society, which is a fabulously apropos symbol for Mars, Neptune and Aquarius.)

 

With these planets combining, we are in a psychically sensitive time, and depending on where this aspect meets up with the natal charts of some people, it will be either more or less fun...more or less chaotic. Just don't expect much of anything to stay much the same for long, particularly where beliefs and perceptions are concerned. But you can look and see through; you can think to the point where you can feel; you can feel to the point where your feelings extend far around you, and maybe even feel the life of the world herself, or human consciousness as one entity.

 

The biggest forthcoming event on the horizon is an eclipse of the Moon on Sunday, April 24, which falls in the mysterious sign Scorpio. Eclipses, as we have seen, have both personal and cultural implications. This is the last big mountain in a mountain range of planetary events and it, too, will shake things up a little, open some doors, close others and point to a few significant mysteries. But it would seem that the most turbulent astrology of the season is indeed over, and by now, with Mercury having turned direct, the world having tucked the pope safely in his crypt and sent him on the way to early sainthood, and equinox definitely having arrived in the Northern Hemisphere, most of us are on a clear course for something different.

 

Notice that the astrology has been working in a series of layers; of potent events that occur in a sequence and gradually reveal the essence of something, such as you.

 

Before I get into a few of your questions this week -- which seem to focus on Neptune rather than retrogrades, as I had planned earlier, I'd like to mention that this project of taking reader questions and offering thoughtful responses is sponsored by your subscriptions to Planet Waves Weekly. We have had quite a few very happy subscribers who came to Planet Waves from this page, we value your participation in the project, and the essay series has been taking some exciting new turns as I weave astrology into the fabric of science fiction. I look forward to being in contact with you there.

 

More news and almost daily blogs at http://planetwaves.net.

 

Here are some of your questions this week.