Happy New Year! I don’t celebrate because January 1st is arbitrary to me, or rather, personally arbitrary: honestly, the beginning of the calendar year is more about stuff I don’t want to deal with, like the previous year’s taxes, the end of celebrations, the beginning of wondering why I don’t own my own snow shovel, the world reminding me that I need to be in better shape (if not overtly through the culture, than through my own inability to shovel snow for very long — but I’ve been getting better, and I have an Aries Moon need to have the strength of a superhero just because)

Stay the fuck home, guys.

Don’t get too excited for New Year’s. I expect a mini-surge on January 5th directly related to tonight’s festivities. Insist on your boundaries; throw rocks if you have to. Throw poop like a monkey. Okay, don’t actually do that, but internalize the sentiment. On January 5th, the Moon in Aquarius conjuncts Saturn, and my assumption is that this is going to cause the public (Moon) to restrict (Saturn) social activities (Aquarius) out of necessity (Moon) because of dumb shit we did in the past (Saturn: past, karma). The most reasonable explanation of this energy is pandemic-related.

Jupiter in Pisces meant the omicron surge, you know.

Jupiter expands on what’s already here, not what you wish was there: A Piscean Lesson

Here’s a tip on making astrological predictions:

Step 1: make predictions based on what you think will happen.

Step 2: go back and make predictions based on what you think will happen whether you like it or not.

Step 3: go back and make predictions based on what you think will happen whether you like it or not based on a sliding scale of reasonableness: predict what is most likely to happen and what is not likely to happen but the astrology screams it because you may not be personally aware that the factors could already be in place.

Jupiter tends to expand on what already exists in material reality; it doesn’t necessarily create new things. That’s more of a Venusian energy, and also more Saturnian. Jupiter in a water sign doesn’t necessarily create things either: Jupiter in expands certainly expands the imagination which allows for more creativity, but it’s not necessarily creative energy.

This isn’t going to be the euphoric music festival we’re hoping Jupiter in Pisces to be.

Jupiter in Pisces expanded on the pandemic, which was a very Neptunian/Piscean thing. It expands on confusion. It expands on a diffuse sense of spirituality with an aversion to institutionalizing it. It expands on deception. It expands on evasiveness. It expands on a desire to return to a simpler time, whether or not that simpler time exists.

Right now, I have enough food to last two weeks without venturing out, which is a feat for me, but the real struggle will be not finding excuses to go out anyway so I can talk to strangers because, as a dear Capricorn friend of mine pointed out, I’m actually extroverted, or at least more extroverted than

But on a personal note, my favorite color is now Pantone’s Color of the Year, so that’s cool:

Mercury goes stationary in Aquarius on January 14th, so get used to being alone.

Mercury will conjunct Saturn at this point, restricting socializing and every day movement. I’m expecting lockdowns and severely restricted movement, as well as more mandatory vaccination to work, to go about. Legally speaking, vaccination status is not a protected status, and it’s absolutely NOT the same thing to not allow unvaccinated person in a movie theater as it would be to not allow a person of color. I also think that if someone throws a Hail Mary pass to the Supreme Court, they actually catch it, and this is argued, we’re going to find that a permanently conservatively-stacked USSC is NOT going to create new protected groups, so there’s some of your Saturn in Aquarius irony for you.

Starting on January 3rd, Chicago will severely limit unvaccinated and partially-vaccinated person’s ability to interact with the community in places where food is served. Now, you can still go to Mariano’s to get your groceries. You just can’t drink at the bar or eat at the cafe unless you’re fully vaccinated. You can still watch The Matrix at home; you just can’t go to the movie theater and see it unless that theater doesn’t sell food or drink. You can go to a bar to drink outside, entirely outside, or use the bathroom, but you can’t drink inside. This restriction doesn’t touch people going to places of worship, soup kitchens, or artists traveling specifically for work, and a few others, but it does apply to people ages five and over.

Is this coercion? The meaning of coercion is the practice of persuading someone to do something by using force or threats. Going to restaurants isn’t a necessity, and it’s not a public interest. Are employer vaccinate mandates coercion? While employees may have a property right in their employment, vaccine mandates aren’t a violation of due process unless they’re being sprung on you and you’re not allowed a bonafide reason to refuse (bonafide religious belief, health condition).

Jupiter in Pisces, however, is going to expand (Jupiter) martyrdom (Pisces), well beyond what we’ve already seen, but in a very convoluted way. As it is, people working in healthcare and with the public on the frontline are actually being forced to expand martyrdom because now even if they’re vaccinated, they’re running the risk of breakthrough infections while taking care of what is an endlessly mounting pile of sick bodies taxing the healthcare system because, in great part, an illusory expansion of martyrdom by people who just simply don’t wanna. And it seems with Mercury being involved in this new variant, people are willing to sacrifice their own children because they don’t wanna. And it’s not even that omicron is worse for kids — it’s not — it’s just that they’re little, they’re not vaccinated, and their risk of catching COVID goes up the more they’re surrounded by mobile adults who can give them COVID.

Compassion Fatigue.

Jupiter in Pisces may expand compassion for each other, but I think that it can also lead to more compassion fatigue. I’m tired of being asked to understand why other people don’t understand how viruses work or how they’re connected to the entire ecosystem in which viruses travel from one body to another in ways we don’t perceive with our senses because if we could, we would have likely eradicated viruses by now because that’s what humans do. You’re either your brother’s keeper, or you wander the earth in exile. Personally, even though Jupiter is ingressing my South Node in Pisces 12th house, it’s aggravating my 6th house North Node, Mars, and Jupiter in Virgo right now, and my sense of discrimination and ideas of what is right regardless of what is comfortable or friendly has been expanded to the point of exaggeration (because that’s what a Jupiter opposition can do).

Venus retrograde and then station on January 30th

Venus retrogrades mean that Venus stays in Capricorn for about four months, and under different circumstances, this would be great. For me, because I have Venus at 0 Capricorn, and while I very much want to socialize, make career connections, go out socially, and I would like to have a boyfriend again, the pandemic is not the time, and I’m very much feeling the deprivation part of Venus in Capricorn. Instead, it just feels like I’m waiting for a lonely time to end, like enduring a contract to live at a lighthouse for a year and not being sure when it actually expires because the document magically keeps scrambling the end date, like I signed it in a dream but am liable in reality nonetheless.

However…Venus goes stationary on January 30th and then direct for February 2022, so maybe those of you who celebrate Valentine’s Day will have something to look forward to before Venus once again makes a conjunction to Pluto at the end of February.

For those of you in pandemic relationships, my guess that this might be a time in which you enter a sort of crisis: with the Sun now entering Pisces and conjuncting Jupiter by the 28th, I think the question “would we still have gotten together if not for the pandemic, and does this have a future when the pandemic ends?” is going to be a nagging thought that gets louder.

Pandemic relationships will be put to the test soon.

Listen: I think a lot of pandemic relationships are interesting because there’s a definite karmic tone as the pandemic began with that Capricorn stellium in 2020 that also included Saturn. As many of you know, karmic relationships don’t always look like socially appropriate ones — they can have large age gaps, large socioeconomic gaps, large gaps in educational attainment, career advancement, cultural values, etc. — and those matter less when your interactions with the world at large are severely restricted. An age gap doesn’t matter as much since you both can’t go to big parties with young people, regardless of whether one of the partners doesn’t want to stay out all night. A wealth gap doesn’t matter as much if you’re not splitting bills at restaurants or you’re both not really working much right now. What your family thinks of the relationship doesn’t matter as much if you can’t travel back home for Christmas with them anyway. An educational gap doesn’t matter as much if you’re both indulging in trash television because you’ve got nothing better to do.

Right now, you both want to survive the pandemic with your body and mind in tact, but does that mean that you both want the same things? And moreover, given that this is the new normal, do you even know what you actually want any more?

However, I have a suspicion that even if the pandemic doesn’t actually end in 2022 that the very end of January through February 2022 when Venus leaves Capricorn for good and enters Aquarius that issues of inequality, inequity, and commitment will have to be addressed because even if this pandemic never ends, we have to figure out if we’re together by circumstance or because we really think we can do this thing. It’ll get really interesting when Venus enters Pisces in April and eventually joins Jupiter and Neptune there. This could be an auspicious time for falling in love, but also for being crestfallen when reality comes crashing down because even if there’s a stellium in late Pisces of Venus, Jupiter, and Neptune, it doesn’t mean that energy benefits humanity, especially if you’re not naturally used to living with Pisces energy. Mercury will be conjunct the North Node in late Taurus, so use your head and be patient before taking the plunge.

On that note, I’m Neptunian, and I’m happy to help you with a relationship reading.

What about the spiritual awakening?

Yes! Jupiter in Pisces IS going to rouse many from their slumbers, but I’ll get to that at a later post.

Looking ahead: Eclipses in 2022

I have to admit that I didn’t bother much with eclipses until this year. I know a lunar eclipse is a final ending, and I know a solar eclipses are rebirths, but I didn’t think much of it until 2021’s eclipse cycle was on my natal sun in 9th house Sagittarius, and I actually did have an ending that was 9th house related and a rebirth. It’s hard to explain, but that’s the reason I’m still here, still doing astrology. No doubt.

However, 2022’s eclipses are all on the Taurus/Scorpio axis, bringing a fixed energy and less wiggle room. When shit ends, shit is destroyed. When shit begins, shit is here to stay. There is either a permanent quality to the beginnings and endings, or more resistance to these changes.

April 30th is a partial solar eclipse in Taurus that will conjunct Uranus.

May 16th brings a total lunar eclipse in late Scorpio that will oppose Uranus and the North Node, creating a T-square with Saturn in Aquarius at the apex.

October 25th has a partial solar eclipse in early Scorpio that will conjunct Venus

November 8th ends 2022’s eclipses with a total lunar eclipse in late Taurus with another T-square. This eclipse will conjunct Mercury and Venus and square, oppose Uranus retrograde and the North Node, and square Saturn in Aquarius at the apex.

So for those of you with planets or points in Taurus/Scorpio and/or in the fixed signs, this is going to be a big deal, especially if you have planets or points conjunct any of these eclipses or have any of the involved planets transiting your fixed sign planets or points. But you already know that.

For me, this will affect me personally, as my Chiron is in 2nd house Taurus and my Mercury Rx/Uranus conjunction is in 8th house Scorpio. Money matters, business, but also skills, talents, and particularly my occult work (like astrology, especially astrology) will be affected. Whereas the last year’s eclipses where contained in my 3rd house Gemini/9th house Sagittarius axis and mostly affected my Sun, Neptune, Jupiter, and angles, I have a feeling that this year’s eclipse cycle is going to take what has been loosened this year and tighten it to something material (Taurus) and intense (Scorpio). I’m going to be forced to do a lot of healing, transforming, and performances of patience on levels I’ve likely not expected of myself.

But perhaps it’s time.

Is it all doom and gloom?

Well…

Happy New Year! I hope you have a nice, socially distanced time, that the exercise equipment you’re about to buy on Amazon on a deep sale doesn’t turn out to be junk you, and that you stay safe and warm.

There will be a snowstorm tomorrow, and my guess is that I’ll be watching it from my periwinkle bed, because we have a long year ahead. My country is having a Pluto return, and I do wonder what’s going to happen to us as a nation. I should write about that soon, but I want a day to not deal with super dire stuff.

I made it through one full year of near isolation, even though in my head, it doesn’t feel that way. It looks that way, me behind a computer, me behind a phone, but it’s actually been one of the least lonely years of my life in a lot of ways, and I’m just going to look forward to a time when we can all hang out in person and you can find out that I actually do talk like this, in person, and I’m sober.

Happy New Year. May 2022 see us living to 2023.