it's the sound of the unlocking and the lift away
When I was a kid, I was really into the occult-- I read every book about ghosts, ESP, witchcraft, etc that I could get my hands on. At some point in about sixth grade, I developed the ritual of reading my horoscope in the paper every afternoon while eating my milk and cookies. It was that terrible part of life when your hormones have awakened and you have crushes that consume your entire soul, but you are hopelessly awkward and ugly and basically certain that nobody will ever love you. So reading my horoscope always meant scrying for signs that that the stars were aligning such that my obsession-of-the-moment would be compelled, fated, drawn into love with me. And the people who write horoscopes know that you are in all likelihood looking for either love or money, so at least three horoscopes a week would be full of thrilling promises of romantic success (which of course never came true). At some point in seventh or eighth grade I began to recognize this pattern, and began to lose faith in the stars. One day, instead of the usual vagaries, my horoscope read "Your taste for exotic food will bring you into contact with a famous writer today." It was so bizarrely specific that I decided then and there that this was the test: if it happened, I would believe forever, and if it didn't, I would stop reading my horoscope entirely. It didn't, of course, happen.
Now I am older and wiser, and I know that love is something that two people decide on rather than something toward which they are compelled by Mysterious Forces. But today I happened to be reminded of Rob Brezney's Free Will Astrology, which I have enjoyed in the past for its smartness and style and general good advice, even if I don't believe in those Mysterious Forces anymore. And this horoscope is pretty shockingly relevant for somebody engaged, as I am, in writing an article that she hopes to get published:
TAURUS: Hope "is not the conviction that something will turn out well," wrote Czech writer and politician Vaclav Havel, "but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out." That's the kind of hope I suggest you invoke during your current adventures, Taurus. Be hungrier for meaning than for any specific outcome. If you do that, ironically, the outcome is more likely to be one you feel pretty good about.
Well, then. This is doubly bizarre, of course, because the article I am writing is in large part about spiritualism & the occult movements in the early 20th century, and the poet I am studying had a particular fondness for astrology. ::Twilight Zone music::
Now I am older and wiser, and I know that love is something that two people decide on rather than something toward which they are compelled by Mysterious Forces. But today I happened to be reminded of Rob Brezney's Free Will Astrology, which I have enjoyed in the past for its smartness and style and general good advice, even if I don't believe in those Mysterious Forces anymore. And this horoscope is pretty shockingly relevant for somebody engaged, as I am, in writing an article that she hopes to get published:
TAURUS: Hope "is not the conviction that something will turn out well," wrote Czech writer and politician Vaclav Havel, "but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out." That's the kind of hope I suggest you invoke during your current adventures, Taurus. Be hungrier for meaning than for any specific outcome. If you do that, ironically, the outcome is more likely to be one you feel pretty good about.
Well, then. This is doubly bizarre, of course, because the article I am writing is in large part about spiritualism & the occult movements in the early 20th century, and the poet I am studying had a particular fondness for astrology. ::Twilight Zone music::