“I hold it ever
Virtue and cunning were endowments greater
Than nobleness and riches.”

— Cerimon, Pericles Act 3, Scene 2

Mars goes Retrograde on September 9, 2020 — in Aries? Know what that means?

Horoscopes for 9.3.2020

Virgo

There’s a totally weird alignment up and coming. At least one source will tell you all about great opportunities, and so on, mostly blowing smoke up a Virgo, never mind. Different metaphor. This arrangement of planets demands that Virgo have some sort of footing in a spiritual realm. For some, this is very simple: go to church. For others, this means prayer and medication.

Whatever works, is what I’m suggesting, as I’m fine with just about all of it. Not quite all, but close enough. The problem for most Virgo that I know? The biggest challenge is getting away from the details long enough to be still, to be quiet, and to let that internal, intuitive voice speak. I figure you got it in you, just, with everything that’s going on? Have to be quiet enough to listen to that intuitive inner voice. Good luck with that. Happy birthday.

Libra

The trick with Mars in apparent retrograde motion, well, not retrograde at the beginning of this scope, but most certainly by the time the next one rolls up, so there is that, right? Anyway, Mars in itself doesn’t offend you much, except for a select few who have Mars right opposite something definitely in Libra at those points. But those who don’t have anything right at that point? Not so bad. However, for those few who do feel it? Mars is fiery orb of anger. Pain. Anxiety. Or?

The flip side of Mars opposite from Libra planets is about timing and figuring out what needs a new course. What needs to change directions. What can be altered to fit the extant situation. What does — and what doesn’t — need to be changed. This also — think that Mars on the opposite side of the cosmic wheel, the chart, think of Mars as a mirror about what needs to be changed. What needs changing is reflected back, I’d like to think in a mirror, but might be in the action of others. Either way, pick and choose what we want to attend to, keeping in mind Mars make this unsettled, at best.

Scorpio

I understand very little about children, other than I was — allegedly — a child myself. Some girlfriends instead I am still childish, but I’m not touching that comment. During the course of interaction with wee ones, usually belonging to single dad I fish with?

Those wee ones are amusing, and I learn from them. One of them had this habit, she would repeat back every last phase or single word, at the end of long statement, to insure veracity and grasp at meaning, trying to understand in her wee mind the nuances of the language. “Nuances of the language?” Exactly like that. “Like that?” Yes. “Yes?” See how this can be infuriating at times, and how, I can quickly devolve into child-like behaviors, getting tired of answering every question repeated back to me. “Me?” Yes. However, as advice for Scorpio, moving forward? Repeat back that last portion of phrase or question directed at you. Might make you look like you’re hard of hearing or something, but the way this kind of communication works? Works really well for Scorpio.

“Really well for Scorpio?”

Sagittarius

I committed what was, at the time, some of what I liked best when I wrote about Mercury in Retrograde — the volume is available online and elsewhere, as The Portable Mercury Retrograde. See my book listing, I guess. The idea, though, is that this is time to pause long enough to review facts. The problem being, the facts, as we — our Sagittarius selves — understand the “facts?” Those facts are mutable, changeable, and liable to be something else next week.

“Facts don’t change!”

Not usually, but then this is Mars stationary and slowly slipping backwards in its errant path, all the while in Aries, which doesn’t do us justice. That little tome of mine, advice and suggestions to ameliorate the pernicious Mercurial Retrograde issues? Same applies to this particular Mars situation. Not bad. Not good. Not either way, just a great big old pause, and reflect on the data. The information collected. The putative “facts,” previously alluded to that might — or might not — change in the following weeks. Change. Not change. No change. Change. Facts shift. I tend to think in language terms and I see the meaning of the words changing, not the words themselves, but your Sagittarius mileage may vary.

Capricorn

Loathe as I am so suggest it, despite all the good influences, the way this stacked up? It can go sideways, badly, in a big hurry. The trick is to slow it down. I performed a brief kind of daycare for a fishing buddy’s kid. Little five-year old boy. Tremendous fun, for me. But at 5? He runs everywhere. Everything is a race, a competition, and he’s in a big hurry to get wherever it is that he wants to go. Our afternoon necessitated a trip to the grocery store for “white milk.” He ran up and down the aisles, and he would’ve bolted through the parking lot if I hadn’t gripped his wee little hand. He did a tug a bit but realized that the laws of physics were on my side: I’m way bigger than him. At least, I’m bigger than him right now. One day? Different question.

What I did was manage to slow him down for a few minutes, at times when it was crucial, like navigating a busy parking lot with someone who wasn’t tall enough to be seen. I was careful. In the store itself? I let him run free. I think he did three or four laps for every aisle, and I kept trying to let him run because it was relatively safe space. Middle of the afternoon. Couple of single moms, everyone in masks, and not much else in the store. However, it is easy to see how this could go from great joy for me, delight in the laughter of a young child to any number of mistakes that send this whole scenario sideways, in a hurry. The Capricorn trick that works? Keep up and keep a grip on what we need to keep a grip on, when we need to do it. Otherwise? Let them roam free.

Aquarius

It’s simple math. Not complicated. As always, my favorite was an image left over from the good, old days. I was frequent customer, more from convenience, than any other factor with a certain downtown drugstore. I always admired the marketing idea that came up with this one idea. I used to buy a lot of “Saints” or “7-Day” candles because I liked the symbolism of the home fires burning. That one store had a special, the candles were $1.50 each or 3 for $5. I developed a working relationship with one of the pharmacy techs, but that was out of need as much as me just being my overtly gregarious self. I never got around to asking about that special tiered pricing on candles. However, this week holds just such a sign. Someplace, I doubt you’r Aquarius self is looking for candles with arcane saints’ names, but watch that bulk price deal. Is it really a deal?

I still wonder how many people would go, “Oh look, three for five dollars, let’s do that!”

Pisces

Cooking with Shakespeare? There are flavors, recipes and combinations left over from much earlier times. I was looking at a recipe for a particulate potion mentioned in Shakespeare’s plays. What I came up with was that the recipe hasn’t changed much in the ensuing 400 (plus) years, but the ingredients are what change. The main ingredient in this one concoction, is heavy cream. In Shakespeare’s era, that would mean farm fresh, as in recently squeezed out of a cow. In our more modern era, that would imply heavy cream from the diary section of the grocery store. I know of one or two places where I can get non-pasteurized products, but frankly, I prefer that added degree of safety, these days. Not that I don’t trust the farmers, just, it’s me, OK? But thinking about the texture, consistency, the flavor the heavy cream, straight from the farm, then cooked up over a wood fire, or coal, that has to taste very different from the homogenized material we all have these days. So the recipe is the same, it’s just the stuff that goes into it? That might be different. Which is an effective way as any to explain why the flavors to this week are different, we followed the recipe, but the stuff we used? Not all the same. Sort of the same, but the texture is different.

Aries

It hasn’t officially started yet, and I’m already out of metaphors. This is not a good sign. Mars hasn’t started his backwards trawl through your sign yet. I lack words to properly convey what this will look like. Is it bad? No. So it’s a good thing? Not really. It’s a matter of understanding what Mars means. Individually, then understanding his relative motion as that plays out against the backdrop of the fiery Aries flavor. The answer is a definite “maybe,” and it won’t change much over the course of the next few months.

“Ah, c’mon Kramer, you can’t say for sure, ‘yes’ or ‘no’? Please?”

Me: out of allegory to suitably explain what is happening so the best answer I can give your Aries self is a “definite maybe.” Might try that one yourself.

“Maybe?”

Right. Definitely.

Taurus

I got this stuff at the big box store, think it was Costco, and it was called Clear Focus, or something like that. Don’t hold me to a brand name, as the stuff didn’t work for me. I am looking for that single ingredient supplement that will preserve my mental capacities, as best as it can be saved. After years and years of abuse, hard use, and maybe one too many knocks? I’m not sure I’m all there, still.

With age comes forgetfulness, and with age comes a withering of some of the processes that served so well in my youth. In my example of me, it’s simple: I’m getting older. It happens. With Taurus, the effect is much the same, but this more due to the relative position and motion — or lack of motion — with Mars in the heavens rather than a real age problem. For that? I’d recommend finding some kind of cheap, almost generic, over-the-counter herbal supplement that promises to enhance the mental focus, clarity, and recall abilities for the Taurus mind. I never noticed any improvement, but for the duration of that big bottle of pills? I felt like I was doing something to help make me smarter.

Gemini

Comes a time when a person has to branch out and go his or her own way. “You can go your own way,” wait, no, not getting into a classical music routine now. Stop that. But there is a time, either now, or later, but I’d suggest we start looking at this right now, for Gemini.

Comes a time when the road less traveled, the route most folks don’t take, the direction that benefits Gemini most? It’s the different way to get “there” from “here.” What’s most amusing, to me, as an outside, non-Gemini observer? Those twin destination points, “there,” and the starting point, where Gemini is at, for this moment, “here?”

As the best mutable Air Sign, those points are rather loosely defined, and we need to leave it at that. I know, it hapless to have a solid starting point to move forward, but there is a long period of up and coming instability in the world, and this rolls over into Gemini sections. However, that being noted, never hurts to forge a pathway that no one else seems have ever done before.

Cancer

“Failure is not an option,” way I tend to hear it. However, in our “real world,” such as it is, failure is always an option. This last time, it came through on a sales list, teaser headline about failure, that leads into a pitch for a product or service that makes “Failure not an option.” But failure is an option. It’s not really a total and abject failure, just a list of items or actions that don’t work. In software terms, it’s not an epic fail, it’s just a beta version, kicking the tires to see what works. This is about framing the narrative, and this is about epic fail as opposed to a temporary setback.

There is a tendency, all that stuff in Capricorn, opposing the gentle Moon Children, yes there is a marked tenancy to turn a small setback, or a simple course correction into “This is an epic fail!” To me, it’s not, but I have years of training and I’ve seen this, the dubious joy of age, I’ve seen this before. Failure is an option, but it’s merely a training exercise, a rough draft, a first try. No worries. “But if this doesn’t work, we’re all screwed!” No, it just means we back up and try a different approach. Retool. Sometimes, even the smallest adjustment will help.

The Leo

I was entertaining a group of friends, and one of them is a femme fatale (Scorpio). There were several of us, and I was unspooling for work, with a glance towards the Scorpio, explained they are really good people not to piss off. “Whatever do you mean, darlin’?” She batted her eyes.

I was trying to explain that things would go very smoothly until suddenly there’s a javelin stuck through my chest, pinning me to the wall, like a bug. “And me, I’m wondering, was it something I said?” The Scorpio nodded knowingly, “Like you said, just don’t piss us off.” The deal I was thinking about, The Leo, was getting pinned like that, like a bug, still squirming, wondering, what happened. I’m here to help that not happen, not to The Leo. The trick is to stay away from people with long, sharp sticks, for starters, then, maybe, thinking about the way that Scorpio explained it, “Yeah, just don’t.” As this martial Mars infused drama period begins? Don’t. Seriously, dear, Leo, don’t.

The Leo hint: Seriously, this isn’t irony or sarcasm. Just don’t do it.

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“Nothing runs on automatic.” – L.W. “Bud” Shipley, Jr.