Today is Thursday, Sept. 1, 2011. The Moon is in Libra until about 2:48 pm EDT, when it enters Scorpio. We’re still in the thrall of the grand earth trine Eric wrote about on Monday, in his post on the Virgo New Moon and Hurricane Irene. Venus has moved out of the equation, but the Virgo Sun’s trine to Jupiter in Taurus is not exact until tomorrow and Pluto in Capricorn is still in the mix. Prior to the storm, Gary Caton noted that “Earth signs are focused on resources, and of course much of the East Coast will be faced with taking a practical inventory of what is and isn’t working.” This is bearing out, as several areas of the East Coast are dealing with a lack of usable roadway by which to get emergency supplies to towns still cut off by floodwater.
This storm moved a lot of earth, and that movement of earth continues as crews work to create temporary emergency roads in the short term — such as in Vermont — and face the daunting task of long-term repair of roads, bridges and buildings. In the Northeast, as much as possible needs to be done before winter snowstorms begin. This may only be the first day of September and technically still summer, but there is a tremendous amount of work to be done in some areas — and mountain regions get snow early.
Personally, I’m still fascinated by the role earth signs have played in what seemed superficially to be a week about water and air. It’s easy to think of earth signs as stable and solid. But then, Rob Hand has described the grand trine configuration as a “very strange and difficult arrangement of planets”; Eric likened it to a closed circuit or vortex like the Bermuda Triangle — where things go in but don’t come out; and Gary described it as being a bit like quicksand: if you get stuck in it, struggling will only sink you faster. Given that quicksand analogy — and the way my day has been going as of this writing — I found it helpful to know the grand earth trine is still in effect. If you too are still feeling its inertia, compounded by Mercury still in shadow phase and moving slowly, don’t struggle against the sucking vortex. You’ll actually have better success and feel better if you relax a little.