Shadows, Shadow Play

Toying with a simple pen and ink depiction, I was trying to convey the messages of Mercury in its apparent retrograde pattern, and what that means, how it plays out, and what the future holds by way of looking at the past.

The timing is what interests me. The messages have largely been familiar, and while my earliest teachers talked about how “Mercury in retrograde is bad,” I’ve grown to understand it is a natural time, and can be useful.

The image, I started with a simple line drawing of the alchemical glyph for Mercury, the symbol I associate with the planet. It looks like a Venus — or female — symbol with a little set of horns sprouting from the head. It is supposed to be a winged helmet, associated with Hermes, the messenger of the gods, later known as Mercury. Although somewhat distanced, Loki is similar in form and function. Personally, I like the character Puck from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream as a mercurial fellow. That symbol, though, a simple line drawing, small circles, stick coming out the bottom, a cross bar, then, the little ears on the top, again symbolic of Hermes’ winged helmet. Mercury had wings on his sandals.

“Fly monkeys, fly!”

Sorry, wrong mythos. Anyway, the glyph? Venus with little antenna, for communications.

Shadows, Shadow Play

June 13, Mercury arrived at 16° Cancer. Mercury crawls up to 26° Cancer, turning retrograde on 6/29. Mercury retrogrades back to 16° Cancer on 7/23, staying at 16° until 7/28. Mercury doesn’t arrive back at 26° Cancer until 8/24 (coincidental with the Sun going into Virgo).

Shadows, Shadow Play

I’ve got a pepper plant thriving with my abuse, overwatering, drought, too much attention, no care, and similar inconsistent behaviors. It’s about two feet tall, and the shade in the direct sun is negligible, but as the afternoon light dips lower on the horizon? That plant can cast a shadow up to a few feet long if only for a short time. The shadow is ephemeral yet still exists. It can appear longer, taller than the object causing the shadow itself. The shadow of Mercury can extend well beyond the known limits of the actual, observed retrograde. This Mercury in Retrograde?

the Portable Mercury Retrograde

Curated Bookshop.org Reading List

Independent bookstores are little pockets of community, learning, and free speech. With individual tastes, and sometimes the elegant, unusual suggestion? Best places cater to local tastes. Bookshop.org raised $50 million for local bookstores.

Curated Bookshop.org Reading List

1. This is Shakespeare by Emma Smith
2. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
3. Neuromancer by William Gibson
4. Dreyer’s English by Benjamin Dreyer
5. Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
6. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
7. Alburquerque by Rudolfo Anaya

Curated Bookshop.org Reading List

1. This is Shakespeare I got to Dr. Emma Smith via her Shakespeare podcasts, and, so it seems, much of the book is drawn from her series of lectures about the individual plays, with the frame being a quick synopsis, then a off-center question that illuminates much about the play. But in a larger sense the text helped me explore approach, and framing of questions for more than just Shakespeare. Since I still use it as a reference, I have both digital and hard copy.
2. Stranger in a Strange Land I didn’t get a first edition of Robert A. Heinlein’s classic, but rather a 10th round paperback. I already had a shelf full of his “juveniles,” space opera for young adults. This was a weird, underground hit from the mid-sixties, pushing thoughtful analysis about culture. Also? Invented waterbeds. Reread every few years, and it seems to hold up for me. Think I have two or three copies including a re-released uncut version.
3. Neuromancer is still a standout. William Gibson mythology suggests the novel was written on typewriter while inventing the notion of “cyberspace.” Still, as the foundation of the Cyber Punk grouping in speculative literature, stylistically, structurally, it is an important novel. I’ll reread it every few years. Wish I hadn’t loaned out my first copy, a rare, first edition paperback that was rather beat-up. One of the best opening lines in “Science Fiction.”
4. Dreyer’s English I only know Benjamin Dreyer by social media, and of all the grammar porn that I have? This is more than a favorite, I have it as both a digital book and hard copy. It’s a happy place for my inner copy editor.
5. Snow Crash Neuromancer, mentioned above, paved the way for my encounters with Neal Stephenson’s body of work, starting with Snow Crash. I don’t know if it changed my life, but I was excited by the novel the first time, and each subsequent rereading is still as vibrant. One of the best opening scenes in a post-modern novel.
6. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Hunter S. Thompson’s work should be closer to the top of the list, and I’ve enjoyed some of his latter works, but this was the one that sealed it. Stands up to a rereading every few years, as it is one of the classics of American Literature. One of the best opening lines in any modern novel.
7. Alburquerque I picked up my copy at a bookstore after I graduated the university, remembering Rudolfo Anaya as one of the leaders of Chicano Lit. Read it on a whim, loved the nature of the story, the background I knew something about the characters where even New Mexico itself took on a personality. Someplace in the series, there’s a scene that has forever stuck with me, possibly magical realism, but really, just shows the “enchanted” part of “The Land of Enchantment.”

Curated Bookshop.org Reading List

• Kramer Wetzel’s little book of transits
• Two-Meat Tuesday