In last month’s Skywatch, we talked about the tug-of-war between Gemini and Sagittarius: Information vs knowledge. This month a string of oppositions puts this theme front and center.

Mercury goes into Gemini as May begins, and stays there until early July. Words flow quickly during this period; topics are multiple and varied. Emphasis is on the collecting and processing of data, the comparing and contrasting of opinions.

‘Tis the season for click-bait. This is a good mindset for multi-tasking, not so good for in-depth processing.

But when Mercury opposes Saturn on May 2^nd-3^rd, the data flow is temporarily checked. The chitchat of social media may feel grossly insufficient, or our access to it may be curtailed. The real world, with its built-in limits and restrictions, demands to be accommodated. We have to reconsider the ways we communicate, and take more responsibility for them.

Trafficking in sound bites all day (Gemini) won’t be enough. We’re called upon to a declare a point of view (Sagittarius).

Mid-month, Mars enters Gemini. However we vent mental energy – by texting and talking, web surfing, running around – it will be ego-driven. There’s nothing wrong with being motivated by our own interests, if we know that’s what’s happening.

If we didn’t know it before, we’ll probably realize it when Mars opposes Saturn May 14^th-15^th. At that point desires may feel frustrated. We’ll have to stop and look at what we actually want, and how we go about getting it.

Slowing down helps. Write up a plan.

The players within

The Sun-Saturn opposition on the 22^nd-23^rd is the third confrontation this month between the flibbertigibbet (Gemini) and the sober old sage (Sagittarius).

If the transit is projected (experienced externally rather than internally), you’ll find yourself in a contest with an outside force who represents one sign or the other. The deeper truth, of course, is that both are parts of you.

The ideal way to handle these oppositions is to recognize each sign where it lives inside of ourselves. Try to pinpoint the quick-witted, curious, factoid-monger (Gemini) within. Then look for your inner authority figure, furrow-browed and principled. If you can identify them both, they keep each other honest.

Consider the chart of whistleblower Edward Snowden, where a Gemini-Sagittarius opposition is the star of the show.

Gemini shows up in Snowden’s double life, as an innocuous tech guy who was really a spy (in fact, a spy spying on spies). His whip-smart Gemini cluster is mirrored by a cluster in Sagittarius that burns with idealistic fire.

Both of these restless signs can be seen in his by-now mythic travels around the world, seeking safe harbor. Both show up in his effort to disseminate (Gemini) a reforming truth (Sagittarius) as widely as possible.

Brain-dead

Perhaps the most primitive expression of Gemini is unalloyed dualism: the reduction of complicated issues to a simplistic good/ bad framework. Snowden’s public persona was subjected to this black-&-white model by the US media⁽¹⁾ (“Hero or traitor? You decide!”). Every one of us falls into the trap of dualism when we accept and absorb the mass media’s dumbed-down worldview.

Sagittarius can be equally brain-dead when it locks into moral intransigence, of which the global news is full of horrific examples. Saturn’s tenure in this sign (Dec 2014- Dec 2017) will show us any number of ways to misuse it, through ethical tyrannies both religious and secular, each claiming the exclusive right to fatal judgement.

This month, look inside yourself with unmitigated honesty. See if you can identify your own potential to use these signs in their less-becoming guises. Then avoid doing it. Try on for size the highest versions of Gemini and Sagittarius that you can imagine.

Consider the figure of Janus, a rarely understood figure from Roman myth. His double-sided visage did not originally refer to his being “two-faced” in the modern sense, of morally dubious. It was a reference to the dual nature of portals, which we use for both coming and going.

The side of Janus that’s visible depends upon which side of the threshold the spectator is standing on.

Note

1 The horizon axis of the US chart is an exact mirror image — to the degree — of Snowden’s. Uncle Sam has a 12 Sagittarius ascendant and a 12 Gemini descendant; Snowden’s is the reverse. This individual and this group entity were fated to oppose each other.