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

Like a Motorcycle

Do not send a me a You Tube link. You Tube is wholly owned by some mega-corp. Doesn’t work for me unless it is really an educational and short link. I don’t even have Tic-tock. Or twitch. Or twitter. I don’t use AI, no Chat or other iterations of software agents. The built-in, online “spellcheck” is as close as I get, but as we all know, “Auto-Correct is the enema.” Scraping through older entries, I found one of my older, rather lengthy copyright notices. Ran something along the lines of:

Do not copy or reuse in any format without expressed written consent from the author. astrofish.net and related subsidiary publications cannot be retransmitted, republished or otherwise copied and distributed without prior written permission.

Which, in retrospect, should cover web scrapers sucking up material for AI-generated dross. Besides, just how many liberal-leaning, central Texas, fishing guides who quote Shakespeare write horoscopes? I’m not really active on social media. Years ago, I automated as much of the task of distribution as possible, and I can’t seem to recreate the steps, now. So it’s simple, see me in person, best information is at astrofish.net/travel. The website is the only place to find me, these days. Dumps to various outlets, but they should all point back to here as the original. I rarely answer messages on the social media platforms. I’ll answer an e-mail faster than a phone call or text. Like substack and other, similar platforms, my simple horoscope mailing list is the easiest way to get this delivered unto thyself. Simple. Easy. Keeps me from being cranky, and I don’t have to stay abreast with the latest trends in social media, marketing, and customer relations.

Like a Motorcycle

I’m too tired.