Saturn-Eris and the Solstice Cluster, part one

This week we embark on what I’m calling the ‘Solstice Cluster’ of events. We’ve just been through a group of events associated with the long-anticipated transit of Venus, which was a bit less than two weeks ago.

A simulated image using color to present radio occultation-derived information on ring particle sizes. Image: NASA.
A simulated image using color to present radio occultation-derived information on ring particle sizes. Image: NASA.

Astrology events tend to cluster up, and the events get going with a kind of momentum that can carry things forward in unexpected ways. I’m guessing you’ve had enough of that by now.

Before I describe the events in the Solstice Cluster, though, there’s an aspect brewing quietly in the background that is calling for some attention — the opposition of Saturn and Eris, which is part of the group. Because so few astrologers are following Eris, you’re unlikely to read about it on most mainstream websites (nor will you see it on most of the alternative sites; I actually don’t know who is writing about Eris regularly).

Eris is a slow-moving body discovered in 2005 that was named in 2006 — and which resulted in the ‘demotion’ of Pluto and astronomers defining the word ‘planet’ for the first time. If you’re curious, you can dive in via this Google search.

Eris, a long-term visitor to Aries (it’s spending more than a century out of its 557-year orbit there), is an outer planet, larger than Pluto. Like all outer planets, it works outside the reach of normal consciousness. Think of it as a deep, driving force within the psyche, stirring up almost impossible to answer questions about who we are.

I think that Eris is responsible for quite a lot of false identity making — that is, answering the question in ways that are not really relevant, or not honest. Currently, Saturn in Libra is in a close opposition to Eris, which peaks on June 27, in the midst of the solstice cluster of events. My summary of this aspect is that if you haven’t formed your identity on your own, you won’t be able to use a relationship to cover for that fact. That may not actually stop anyone, but if you get confused, you now have a fallback position.

By this, I mean you have another way of viewing or analyzing the situation that will make sense of why things seem so strange in a relationship. The relationship is the likely effect, not the cause.

Since 2001, Saturn has been opposing slow-moving outer planets, one after the next. This has defined a long phase of our lives. In 2001-2002, Saturn opposed Pluto on three occasions. That began the “post-9/11 era” and the rise of the national security state.

Just when we were getting used to being leered at suspiciously when mumbling in Arabic, hoarding duct tape and taking our shoes off in airports, in 2006-2007 Saturn in Leo opposed Neptune in Aquarius. We in the United States experienced the hurricanes in the Gulf Coast region, and the world began its (Neptune-like, invisible) slide into the great recession.

Then between late 2008 and mid 2010, Saturn (which likes stability) opposed Uranus (which likes change and revolt) on five separate occasions. So between 2001 and now, it’s been one thing after the next — and that structure-holding property of Saturn has endured one test after the next.

This has manifested in personal and collective ways, and it’s been extremely stressful; there has been little in the way of relief. As I’ve pointed out before, there is no culturally-embraced event that is the opposite of a Sept. 11 or a Hurricane Katrina. Things tend to get worse all at once, and better only gradually. Of the four oppositions by Saturn to outer planets, this last one is the most personal, because — involving Aries and Libra — it describes something on the personality level. To me this feels like the results of investing so much energy in negativity, contraction and fear over so long.

Many people are emotionally calcified and few have a clue just how uptight they are. Now, however, we arrive at a release point — or at least that’s what is being described by the planets.

The first event is the Gemini New Moon on Tuesday. This is the New Moon in the exact degree of the 9/11 Moon, the 12/26/04 Indonesian earthquake Moon, and a degree prominent in the charts of WikiLeaks, the Fukushima quake, Japan itself, the Titanic and a number of other seemingly unrelated events. One New Moon will make contact with all of those charts.

I don’t know what to say about this except to treat it like a New Moon but with the respect of an eclipse. Clearly this is a world-scale event, leaning on the first degree of Cancer (which will, in a subtle, slow-acting way, set off the Aries Point — that zone of the zodiac where our private lives and the big world around us seem to intersect).

This is just the beginning of a rapid series of events that culminates with the Capricorn Full Moon of July 3 — two weeks of guaranteed adventure. I will be back tomorrow with the rest of the Solstice Cluster.

28 thoughts on “Saturn-Eris and the Solstice Cluster, part one”

  1. I do not use Eris in astrology and I find your reasoning on Eris as the cause of the downgrading of Pluto in 2006 very interesting because it is since fall of 2006 that I have gradually abandoned Pluton. I was tired of the interpretations in the forums about Pluto, apprentice astrologers take Pluto as guilty of their headaches, you imagine the psychological consequences…
    What will be interesting to study this is the Eris and Uranus meeting to be held in 2016, after the series of square between Pluto and Uranus….

    Opposition Saturn, I see more as a disorder… on the plan policy, which did not breach in France with the Tweet of the companion of the President of the Republic on the issue of the candidate was la Rochelle and status that passed under the nose has his ex Ségolène Royal who had suffered a defeat in the presidential in 2007 with Sarkozy.
    Then all depends on what will generate the new moon for each of us, which will delay or press the accelerator of the train in motion….

  2. “oh — and check this out: i just realized today that MARS will FINALLY clear its own long-ass echo phase with the solstice (tomorrow afternoon, to be exact). eric will be covering this in tonight’s Daily Astrology.

    i was beginning to think mars would *never* clear that patch of virgo! holy crap.

    🙂

    (and, curiously: the last degree of mars’ echo is *exactly* conjunct the degree of my new playmate’s jupiter — within one arcminute — which is Rx in virgo in his 12th house. that first arcminute of new virgoan ground is where his jupiter is. hmmm….. that seems something to ponder….)”

    “long ass echo phase” soooo long!

    Mars’ retrograde in Virgo neatly bookended my natal Pluto, 3 Virgo to my mean North Node, 23 Virgo (true node 24). Meanwhile, over in Pisces, Neptune and Chiron have been all over my natal Chiron 0 Mars 2 conjunction for a good bit of the Mars Rx.

    Mars now moves to activate a mutable grand cross for me, Gemini, BML/Vulkanus/Sisyphus 26/27/28, Virgo True NNode 24, Sagittarius, Galactic Center/Spanish version of my name/Juno 26/26/27, Pisces, True SNode conjunct Venus and Photographica, 24 Pisces.

    Just in time for the first Pluto/Uranus square June 24th. Time to get shit DONE!

    🙂

  3. Eris is 1o + from conjunct my N Saturn in Aries 23o51′ opposite that Tr Saturn……….A series of extra expenses has forced me into applying for an emergency grant to catch up and in doing so have had to prepare a spread sheet. It brought home the realization that my SS income is ONLY $3.66 per hour. That is LESS THAN ! 1/2 the minimum wage, while the Senators & Reps make $50.00 per hour, while killing me softly with their obstructions…….I, googled, called the SS office in DC (not where you replace your lost card, the HEADQUARTERS) found I don’t have any recourse as it is structured ( Capricorn) now. I claimed early Widow’s Pension in 1999, @ 60, when Clinton was Pres. we had a surplus, and I could live comfortably on it. I couldn’t find a job, paid rent on a crappy little apartment in Portland, & owned a 6 room house Downeast where most of my art supplies, books etc, were. So I collected and came home. I was offered a much prized job with a local printer, discovered I would lose one of every 3 dollars of the Pension, rather than being able to SAVE IT for when I was over 65 & too tired to work. ( This is for the men who would cash in & retire @ 62, it hurts Single women most mothers………..PRE Lily Ledbetter Law! ( Should be retroactive to include older women) After 5 daily round trips to work and wear & tear on my prized diesel RaBBIT TRUCK, I wouldn’t make enough extra to count! I decided instead to free lance at my artwork. I did then do a 2 year Americorps VISTA stint & was allowed to keep the whole Pension as well……….I advanced myself by paying off my USDA heater loan, bought a used computer, and another newer dsl Rabbit ( still driving it)( & I covet that little blue dsl Rabbit truck I see driving around in Kingston NY!) With the disaster capitalism since then, I am out of money on the 15th of every month( as are most of my friends) There are no jobs for a 73 yr old, and I am cheated out of the ink, envelopes, etc I need to run a very modest business.
    I am seriously mulling over the idea of initiating a class action suit against SS & the DOL Bureau of Labor Statistics, which calculates the CPI and says we have little inflation. ( Free market corporations lower their prices, offer “deals” to keep sales up in this depression………….Makers of food products, necessary items, warehousers, and supermarket owners DO NOT! They need to separate the two catagories. Coupons for “fabric softener” ?, are given out, the coffee coupons stopped a year ago, pet food is escalating, no wonder FB is full of compassionate posts to rescue/adopt abandoned pets.
    I Uranus, Venus 10o Aries 10th H, propose to force them to change the regulations Pluto Capricorn 7th house ( partnership/open enemies) to truly provide a safety net, not the sham we have now. The annual statement from SS DOES SAY BY LAW, INCOME MUST INCREASE TO MEET INFLATION! 2008,9,10,11 …….were all illegal.My $23. per month raise this year almost meets 2008’s inflationary prices…………………Tr. Pallas will conjunct that 10o Venus on july 1st. Juno is conjunct my 23o51′ Scorpio Moon now, Vesta hit my Taurus Sun June 1, Ceres is headed for a return 16o Gemini in my 12th house in July or Aug. My True Lilith is 1o33′ Pisces about to conjunct R Neptune again! Return of the Goddess energy indeed!

  4. paola,

    I am not angry at you at all. I agree with you. I think I have not been very good at expressing myself. I understand you perfectly and yes, we do focus on the money but not in the way I am seeing my father do or some other people I know. Those are the ones who make money more important than the people in their lives; more important than helping their fellow human beings and more important than just about anything. The focus I am talking about is materialism and it is the thing that is beginning to crumble under the current astrology. It is ok to watch your money, use it wisely, and carefully spend it but another to be so focused on materialism that love and caring is excluded.

    I know I have not been clear in delineating that. I do not assume that either you are poor or you focus on the money…it just happens that we have been poor (the working poor, we are in that statistic) because we chose to invest in our family instead of on having material things. I hope that makes sense. Thank you for the compassion…it is appreciated!

  5. PS: in ‘ascension 101’ – the website quoted by Patty – there is also a great meditation on money.

  6. Carrie,
    you can ‘focus on the money’ and just enjoy it flowing to and from you, no obsession.
    You don’t have to be poor not to focus on the money.
    It’s not a two-way option: Poor OR obsessed by money. There are countless tones in the middle, before, after, around, above and under.
    And I am saying it to myself too, of course!

    Now – maybe you will get angry at me or write a long answer.
    But, please, know that I am saying this to you from my heart. I have read words that pointed to this ‘dilemma’ several times from you, I don’t want to stay silent as if I hadn’t noticed. I just want to help.
    Love.

  7. Cluster what? I can think of a particular colorful phrase that adequately describes what has (and is) happening! In mythology – Eris is equated with strife and trouble + Saturn with structure and conformity + Pluto/Uranus square = an enormous amount of energy at odds. We have also been under siege from the CME’s and flares coming from the Sun. Where does all that energy go? How do we either release it harmlessly or channel it for the greatest good?

    “This is the New Moon in the exact degree of the 9/11 Moon, the 12/26/04 Indonesian earthquake Moon, and a degree prominent in the charts of WikiLeaks, the Fukushima quake, Japan itself, the Titanic and a number of other seemingly unrelated events.” (28 Gemini)

    My Mars at 27, Pallas at 25, rising at 24 & Jupiter at 20 Sag along with Cap Sun in the first is making this a very intense time (yes and Chiron in there too!). As I look back to what was happening in my life at the time of some of these events at 28 Gemini – Fastening my seatbelt – it’s going to be a bumpy night!

  8. “Things tend to get worse all at once, and better only gradually.”

    Hail yes. For us and all my cyber (and local) friends. Dave still has no job. A cyber friend just got notice her “it will be a forever rental” landlord wants to sell the home (she has kids, one of whom is a special needs one and who finally is in a school who meets his needs) , and now all this “Fukushima is going to blow” and “29 Gemini means stuff the last of which were negative” fear messages is being spouted everywhere (not just here).

    Be positive? Fat chance with all this negativity coming in.

    It just makes me want to shut down.

    On a weird note, my dad finally stepped foot in my home yesterday after not bothering for nearly 20 years. He was totally surprised because he thought the $1200 rent we pay meant we had a big house on a hill with a huge yard. In other words, he didn’t believe me when I said I have no room for him to live with me. Surprise, dad-who-neglected-to-maintain-a relationship; I don’t have what he thought I had. I manage his care and saved his life twice and all he does is bitch about how bad he has it. He gets over $3000 a month in retirement and most of it goes for his daily care because his health is crap. We live on so much less for six people and we are not constantly complaining about how awful life is. He is the epitomy of the knuckle-dragging (he donated to the Religious right for years and the GOP), money-focused, selfish, sonofabitches Mystes posted about in another comments section. Yet I repay his assininity (is that even a word?) with kindness, compassion and care.

    In him I see the results of focusing on the money and it isn’t pretty. I dont want to be like him (and I am not) and surprisingly I feel happy and content most of the time with my frugal life.

    So whatever happens, I have learned to trust the universe. Bring it on. We ( Dave and I and the kids) might start drowning but we know how to swim and to float and we know how to help others. I think that will just have to be enough.

  9. so:

    earlier today len mentioned to me that venus is beginning to slow to station direct in (june 28 in Gemini, Merc-ruled sign) and i thought, “no *wonder* the last couple days — continuing today — have been marked by increasingly Mercury Rx-like incidents! (several wrong numbers, both phones acting up, some miscommunication, a play i was in gurgling its final death rattle and dying two weeks before it was supposed to go up).

    if this is the beginning of Venus’ storm period, it’s looking like it might be kind of a long ride. anyone else noticing stuff like this? or is it just that venus is currently opp my natal neptune?

    oh — and check this out: i just realized today that MARS will FINALLY clear its own long-ass echo phase with the solstice (tomorrow afternoon, to be exact). eric will be covering this in tonight’s Daily Astrology.

    i was beginning to think mars would *never* clear that patch of virgo! holy crap.

    🙂

    (and, curiously: the last degree of mars’ echo is *exactly* conjunct the degree of my new playmate’s jupiter — within one arcminute — which is Rx in virgo in his 12th house. that first arcminute of new virgoan ground is where his jupiter is. hmmm….. that seems something to ponder….)

  10. “…but the fact is, our only shield is the law. Common decency is no longer enough.
    In order for law to be operational, the status of personhood has to be fairly stable.”

    Ah, Mystes, I suspect that our shield has been has been sold, bought and paid for by the corpornicated “persons” and other “dark money.” (I watched as much I could stand of Bill Moyers’ interview with Thomas Frank, historian and author of “Pity the Billionaire.”) Unfortunately, the “systems” (court, financial, economic, governmental, et al) have all been permeated with the *chaos* ofgreed and power.

    If decency were common, we would all have it and use. Decency, like sense, isn’t common.

    JannKinz

    PS: “Problem is, once these knuckledraggin’ sunsabitches push their penisbots into the air, water and soil, the sequences that code for wisdom go all cattywhompus-sideways.” Oh, yeah, that’s going on the computer and refrigerator and sent to as many people as I can muster up. Thanks, Mystes.

  11. Shakalaka BOOM!

    Katie Scarlett, you do seem to be enamoured of the contrapuntal position. I am not *altogether* convinced of your allegiance to DDT, but as an outbreath of Eris, you are *on* the scene.

    Yeah… ‘multidimensional’ huh? Problem is, once these knuckledraggin’ sunsabitches push their penisbots into the air, water and soil, the sequences that code for wisdom go all cattywhompus-sideways. Now, I am a *big* fan of chaos, just lived through 4 months of unremitting, but there are some expressions that scramble the earliest photonic emissions of awareness. Just *how* weaponry got down to that level is another discussion – but the fact is, our only shield is the law. Common decency is no longer enough.

    In order for law to be operational, the status of personhood has to be fairly stable. Hence the Eris problem. Up here in sigh-bear-space we can fool around with multivalent identity all we want, but out there where photosynthesis is Queen, there are generational codes to be honored. Two selves beget another; one self divides into itself septannually; that sort of thing.

    Les temps plus bonne may very well roller, but ne pas roller rien sans droit.

    ***
    **
    *

  12. “Things tend to get worse all at once, and better only gradually.”

    In the realm of my personal life, this really hits the nail right on the head. Over the last few years, it is a though situations have been introduced suddenly, kablammy, and I reacted badly or ineffectively. It seems to have taken ages to rectify some of these and the slow part has forced me to look at my personal actions. It seems that the slower the process of solution, the deeper the personal transformation has been rooted. My moon sits at 22 Libra in the 11th. A few days before Saturn first crossed this degree, an extremely personal and negative event took place in my life. It was a slap in the face- a real wake the hell up moment. The last 7-8 months have been profoundly about how I interact with self and others. I can’t say I’ve come full circle, but I am thankful for the wake up call and the awareness it brought.

    Thanks for the info (and for allowing a place to share musings!)

    BTW- Boots Hart recently posted an article on this topic at Daykeeper Journal-
    http://www.daykeeperjournal.com/2012/06/saturn-eris-2/

  13. Why get stuck with only ONE measly identity when the sky’s the limit? That’s what New Agers and quantum physics tell us. Anyway, ascribed status is so, well, feudal.

    While I cannot speak specifically to Eris, I do know that 2012/2013 and Neptune in Pisces and Jupiter in Gemini will reveal to all Earthbound souls just how kaleidoscopic and deeply multidimensional life can be.

    As that sagacious Gemini Walt Whitman once observed: “…I contain multitudes.” As for Pisces…how deep is the ocean, how wide is the sea?

    Meantime, au revoir, mes enfants. Laissez les bon temps roulez!

  14. Great stuff to think about.
    Phil Sedgwick also writes a lot about Eris.
    Appreciation to both of you.

  15. “Also, that new moon will exactly square my Chiron. Anyone else? There MUST be tons of us?? How is that feeling?”

    Not a square for that in my chart – an opposition, though mercifully not exact. I have felt the pressure these last several weeks, with the life I don’t want to live clutching at me with tentacles, trying to suck me back into its vortex. I like the image of waving, not drowning, though it’s tough to do that when flailing against the grasping tentacles that are trying to pull me back down. A rip current? I know, stop fighting, swim parallel to the shore. Workin’ on it.

    For me (at age sixty), it’s not so much “memories of the awesomeness getting hijacked” but more the “long overdue realization” that we have (and are) being fed so much shit that it is overwhelming to know where to begin to change it. I do not like being conned. Maybe we can “get things right” this time, or at least take small collective steps toward that, and find our individual steps in that march.

    But, like Brendan, I’m trying to keep a calm and open heart in the face of all that is soooo wrong on this planet. Thank you, Eric and PW, for the astrological compass and grounding tools.

    JannKinz

  16. I had a dream this morning that the water came. Well, first, a missile was launched. High overhead it arched. Not going to give all the details, but the water quickly came after that. I was on the phone saying that the waterfall we lived on was gone. It was all water now, no falls at all. I looked at my husband, we were both peaceful. This is it, I thought. I bent over and picked up my dog. He went to get the cats.

  17. “Also, that new moon will exactly square my Chiron. Anyone else? There MUST be tons of us?? How is that feeling?” So that’s what it is. Thanks, Michele. Had regained my calm and balance for a few minutes – has gone pretty dark again (but with more light than before).
    Happy happy Birthday to you!

  18. Brendan. Exactly “These last few weeks have been smooth for me, no trauma, just a lot of personal evolution and long overdue realizations.”

    I feel equipped, and where I’m not, I am equipping. Which is totally different from arming. Tools are different… Because you can pull one out as a situation/person requires. (Or for myself, when need be.)

    I remember my son, then-16, talking about preparedness. “The world is going to change, mum.” My then-reaction was: Fine, I guess I’m going down with it. But the last few years have utterly changed me, or I’ve changed myself (with some very helpful people with very helpful information)… And I am not prepared to go down. That’s me waving not drowning.

    Plus, my 45th birthday is coming right up and I intend to celebrate. And there is much to celebrate.

  19. Michele – It’s kind of like waiting for the other shoe to drop, isn’t it? These last few weeks have been smooth for me, no trauma, just a lot of personal evolution and long overdue realizations.

    Whatever comes forth, I’m ready for it, with a calm and open heart.

  20. “I’m guessing you’ve had enough of that by now.”

    No, actually. Long overdue.

    “My summary of this aspect is that if you haven’t formed your identity on your own, you won’t be able to use a relationship to cover for that fact.”

    Agreed.

    Honestly? I’m a little bit impressed that me and the cosmos seem to be in synch. Doesn’t seem to matter what gets popped out to join the “clusters.” Oh, that’s doing that with that. Right. Seems to explain this pretty well. Next.

    I will say, though, that I would not be so friendly with shit it it were not for the fact that my now-adult babies have taken responsibility for themselves. That makes a huge difference in a woman/mother’s life.

    Also, that new moon will exactly square my Chiron. Anyone else? There MUST be tons of us?? How is that feeling?

    PS. That’s a mysterious degree 29 Gem… I’d be OK with the world not blowing to smithereens this week. It would be cool to have an upteenth opportunity to “get things right.” People have been talking about that since I was a tiny girl. I have lots of books from that time period. And my own memories of the awesomness getting hijacked. Maybe with this go-round (provided we have more chances) I can actually help do something about it.

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