The new calendar year starts on a note of sobriety. The Sun conjoins Saturn – at its most Saturnine, in Capricorn — on the second day of January; Mercury does so on Jan 11th -13th. These cool, retentive transits serve to emphasize the restrained nature of the season, winter in the Northern Hemisphere. Father Time […]

There are five planetary ingresses this month. Venus and Mercury move into Scorpio within hours of each other as December begins, Mercury moves into Sagittarius on Dec 12th, The Sun enters Capricorn at the Solstice on December 21st, and Mars enters Aries on the last day of the year, auguring a bombastic New Year’s Eve. […]

Three planets change direction this month. Each of these pivots is an invitation to get to know that planet’s symbolism more directly and intimately than usual (see August’s SkyWatch for tips on using planetary stations). Venus and Mercury station on the same day, Nov. 16th. Venus, back in Libra going retrograde, will turn around and […]

Venus goes retrograde this month, stationing on Oct 5th at 10 Scorpio. She dips back into Libra on Halloween and won’t go direct again until the middle of November. Venusian retrogrades are relatively rare; and as transit-trackers know, the rarer the event, the more important the lesson. The five weeks of Venus’ backwards motion give […]

A couple of oppositions this month will test our ability to balance the real and the surreal. The key is to honor both: the worldly Sun (9/7) and Mercury (9/13) in Virgo, and the other-worldly energy of Neptune in Pisces. One way of doing this is to voluntarily access the oceanic mind, whence all creativity […]

There are three planetary stations in August. Uranus stations retrograde on 8/7, Mercury goes direct on the 18h, and Mars stations direct on the 27th. Each station is our private appointment with the cosmos. Each is a chance to make closer contact than usual with the forces the planet represents. When a planet slows down […]

Mars has a lot to teach us in July. It galvanizes an opposition as the month begins and a T-square as the month is ending. How’s your relationship with fixity? Mars in Aquarius will tend to trigger the things we dislike about the fixed signs — inflexibility and stubbornness — as well as the things […]

June begins with a prickly Neptune square, which establishes the tone for the month (exactitude 6/5-7). The Sun and Mercury, airy and logical in Gemini, are faced with the vast inscrutability of the oceanic mind. Popular astrology offers up plenty of symptoms associated with this notorious aspect: confusion, free-floating anxiety, forgetfulness, the tendency to space […]