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So flies the reckless shepherd from the wolf;
So first the harmless sheep doth yield his fleece,
And next his throat unto the butcher’s knife.

King Henry in Shakespeare’s Henry 6.3 5.6.7-9

Horoscopes for 1.9.2020

Capricorn

Pure magic. In my own mind, it’s pure magic. Motoring along under the winter sky, a brilliant, early evening sunset display, and in the background, the gentle — slightly nasal — twang of Robert Earl Keen on the stereo. It’s a live version, and he’s either singing about waitress named Shelia, or the family getting drunk at Xmas time, or how the road goes on forever, with this coming off one of various “live” albums. Essential Texas music — REK has a birthday coming up — and the perfect backdrop for this week’s excursions.

Capricorn excursions.

More than 20 years ago, Robert Earl Keen’s “Live #2” perfectly captured the essence of a Texas honky-tonk, dive-bar, road-house band sawing its way through local hits. I am unsure that the music ever totally transcends the Texas experience, too. Still, this is part of the hues and shades of my world, and on that winter’s eve, setting Sun is in Capricorn, Mr. Robert Keen is singing about some aspect of life around here, and the as the light leaks out of the day, there’s a sense that we’re doing what we’re supposed to be doing. Saturn is here to check up on Capricorn, and Jupiter making sure that this sails along without a hitch.

Aquarius

I dug around in some historical crap to get a better sense of what this alignment in Capricorn is all about. This has happened before, and what it does, for Aquarius? This was about foundations. Foundations for a revolution. Foundations for sweeping social and economic change. Fundamental shifts in the zeitgeist of the times, a better understanding of man’s place in the world. Or woman’s place, whatever. Humans. Sweeping shifts in humanity’s outlook, and this led to a better grasp of what is really important.

What’s most important?
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A little gale will soon disperse that cloud,
And blow it to the source from whence it came;
Thy very beams will dry those vapors up,
For every cloud engenders not a storm.

Clarence in Shakespeare’s Henry 6.3 (5.3.10)

Horoscopes for 1.2.2020

If you are under 20 years old, then yes, that’s right, you’ve never seen this before. But seriously, anyone over the age 21? Ain’t our first rodeo like this, no matter what the pundits suggest.

Capricorn

Happy new year, happy birthday to some, and aren’t we glad we’re all starting over? It’s a new dawn. We’ll see how that works. In the bulk of Shakespeare’s canon of works, there is a question never fully answered, more like a rhetorical question, do the skies, the heavens, the odd gods define our fates? Or are we free agents, able to pick and choose our own destiny, with the hand of fate not playing a part of this one?

Determinism, versus free will, and what picks what happens to us? Is our fate a sealed deal, all depending on the some arbitrary arrangement of stars and planets in the night’s sky? Or are we free to pick and choose, and is this just totally random?

Heavy, metaphysical question, free will versus pre-determined fate, and one that weighs heavy on the Capricorn soul. Are we in charge of our destinies, or is there a collective, guiding consciousness that helps direct us? Again, heavy material, happy Capricorn birthday, and is it freedom of choice, or are we doomed? I tend to believe that the planets and their orbs describe energies, and then, that we — as humans on planet earth — get a chance to respond to those energies. It’s about how we respond to what’s presented, rather than believing that fate is a complete novel, already written. That’s my understanding, this moment. Might change. However, in making that first assumption, as a starting point? It’s about picking and choosing how your Capricorn self responds to what is offered up this new year.

Aquarius

While waiting someplace, maybe, I don’t recall, I overheard a young mom tell her, looked like a three year-old kid, the mom said? “You can have a baby when you have a license.” I smirked, then pursed my lips, and sotto voce, “You have to have a license to have a baby?” I believe the response, was, “Well, right. Only makes sense. So she can have a job, and drive her car to work and the grocery store because I’m not going to do it, you know.” My mind slipped off towards a different direction, a baby license, like, have to pass a written test, and then, drive a test baby around the block or something. Good thing this isn’t left up to me.
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Not from the stars do I my judgment pluck
And yet methinks I have astronomy,
But not to tell of good or evil luck,
Of plagues, of dearths, or seasons’ quality;
Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell,
’Pointing to each his thunder, rain, and wind,
Or say with princes if it shall go well
By oft predict that I in heaven find.
But from thine eyes my knowledge I derive,
And, constant stars, in them I read such art
As truth and beauty shall together thrive
If from thyself to store thou wouldst convert;
Or else of thee this I prognosticate,
Thy end is truth’s and beauty’s doom and date.

• Shakespeare’s Sonnet 14

The December Deal special opportunity.

Year at a Glance: 2020

Astrologically speaking, what does the next year look like?

Horoscopes for 12.26.2019

Had to happen sooner or later, but that’s a whole Shakespeare sonnet, #14, stretched out as this week’s preamble, which, I will add, includes a clandestine overview of the next year. The use of the term, “astronomy” in line two, that was from an era when astronomy and astrology were pretty much on the same page.

New Moon in Capricorn, Dec. 26, 12:13 AM Central. Objects in the mirror may be closer than they appear.

“Boxing Day” is a quaint British — as far as I know — tradition.

Capricorn

Older guy looked at me, shrugged his shoulders, “It’s another ‘grip and grin,’ you know.” Never heard it like that. Totally new phrase, to me. While I was, over the years, used to the expressions, like “Press the flesh,” or “meet and greet,” I never heard “grip and grin.”

It was one of those situations, soldier up, where we’re forced to interact with countless, swarming hordes, some are people eager to meet us, and some are people, well, “Not so eager?” There is that. It’s not all bad, but I tend to stay away from the catered chicken or — personal experience suggests — stay far away from the catered fish dish. I tend to stick with sad vegetables that are over-cooked with runny sauces that seem to have melted between cooking and catering, usually a day — or more.

Older wire-heads used to call this “meatspace,” a place where we all had to physically interact, and some of the kids these days, they do seem clueless, unable to look up from their phones. While I prefer to hibernate during this time? I’m not Capricorn, and there’s a certain calling that must be answered, pressing you into service.

“Grip and grin,” it’s the way your next year looks. Practice the elevator pitch. “You got 20 seconds to sell me.” Get ready, it’s the special Capricorn season to grip and grin.

Aquarius

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

It’s a quote that I started this year with, at the very beginning of 2019 — Nothing runs on automatic. As we look 2020 solidly in the eye? That quote kept echoing in my mind. First place I saw? Shipley Donuts, and I dismissed the quote as a “founding father” aphorism that seemed a little out of place. Donuts, how hard can that be? The one place that’s close, while it’s not anything I’d eat out of habit, I got one buddy, and that’s his catnip, plain, glazed donuts from Shipley’s. So I kept seeing the sign, and I incorporated it in some of my work, as reminder, more to myself than anyone else, that there’s always the human touch required.
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