A Transitional Phase

By Len Wallick

Tomorrow the Aries Moon reaches its first quarter phase at 6:31 am EST. That and a few other choice tidbits will be the subject of today’s blog. Luna is always one to deliver a message. Luminary of the night, it is at once straightforward and complex, regular and variable, intimate and mysterious. It is integrated deeply into our consciousness and probably encoded somewhere in our DNA. After looking at the Sun, any astrologer would be well advised to next locate the Moon.

The first quarter includes a lot of stuff. First, the Moon is halfway between new and full. That means it is separating from the Sun. Therefore, whatever dichotomy that is synchronous with the phase is probably widening. It also means that the aspect between Luna and Sol is that of a square. If there is a line connecting the Earth and Sun, the Moon is longitudinally at a 90 degree angle to that line.

That angle is where we find the beginning of the Moon’s message. Signs are grouped in different ways. Line them up and have them count off by fours, that’s the element — earth, air, fire and water. If they count off by threes, that’s the quality. Cardinal, fixed and mutable. All signs of the same quality are at right angles to each other. In spite of that, for some reason that goes way back before Robert Hand’s beard, cardinal signs are the ones associated with squares. Perhaps it is the season thing.

Cardinal signs begin when the Sun turns a corner. One when as far south as it can go, over the tropic of Capricorn. One when it is far north as it can go, over the tropic of Cancer, The other two when transiting the equator, which sign depending on Sol’s direction at the time. Four seasons, four corners, one honkin’ square.

When the Sun is turning one of those corners, every blessed human being on Earth knows it, or at least has access to the awareness. It is a common experience but not an identical one. That’s where the “personal is political” part comes from. Your personal experience of the Capricorn solstice (this year accompanied by a lunar eclipse for emphasis) is unlike any other. At about the same time, however, everybody else on the planet is having their own personal, personal experience which makes it a public (hence, political) event.

Add in synchronicity and whenever the cardinal signs, in particular the first degree, are triggered and you can bet your Antikythera Mechanism that whatever is going on in your home is in some way playing out on the street corner, the stock market, the United Nations, what have you.

So what does that have to do with the Moon? Check out 2011 so far. First two Mondays find Luna in cardinal signs. Solar eclipse in cardinal sign. Now, First Quarter too. You don’t have to sing for Western Union to get that message. Here we are in the transition. Between the cardinal T-square of 2010 and the Uranus-Pluto rendition of 2012, which is already in the recording studio and booking a tour of Japan. In the break time in between, what do we get? Macaroni and cheese? No, what we get is more cardinal action than a January red sale at the Vatican.

Think about it. Somebody in the news? Pull up that person’s natal chart and you can be sure the cardinal signs are sitting pretty on Boardwalk and Park Avenue. Pass not Go and leave your two hundred dollars by the door. Some sort of headline news event? Betcha there’s a heavy emphasis on cardinal sign in the event chart. Holy cow, this is no break, this is no transition, this a continuum. That’s what the Moon is telling us. It is telling us to get used to it. If you hear a bell tolling, check your personal electronic device, it’s for you. The dichotomy widens as we read.

And the Sun and Moon have their partners on tomorrow’s corner. One if by conjunction, two if by trine. An hour and a half before the elbow is bent, Luna conjoins with Eris. That’s the same way-out dwarf planet that just turned direct Sunday and the same one that will oppose Saturn later this year. Eris has a future and that’s part of the message also. Eris will be telling us where we are going. Half an hour later, the lesser luminary exacts a trine with Vesta, currently fire-walking in Sagittarius. It’s always a good idea to keep an eye on Vesta. The Romans did. The Moon is saying we should too. This little asteroid is going to shed some mighty light about the time of the Moon’s last quarter.

And the Capricorn Sun has an earth sign partner of its own for a trine. Talk about far out. Talk about not wanting to forget. It’s so far out there it makes a trip to Eris look like a walk to the corner store. Ever think about reaching up and touching the stars when you were a kid? Of all the things that go around the center of our solar system, Sedna comes closest to doing just that. It’s the greater luminary’s trump card tomorrow. It’s not just the Moon that is sending a message. If Eris is indeed telling us where we are going, Sedna is telling us what’s out there. We’ll expand on that sooner or later, sometime down the road. There’s plenty of time and lots of stuff in between.

Don’t say the Moon didn’t try to tell ya’.

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