The Astrology Blog 4 July 2022
All times in BST
“We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once.”
“It is a very old saying that you never can tell what you can do until you try. The more I see of life, the more I am convinced of the wisdom of that observation.”
Calvin Coolidge – 4 July 1872, 30th president of the United States from 1923 to 1929
https://www.astrotheme.com/astrology/Calvin_Coolidge
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CALVIN COOLIDGE
When I did a birthday search for 4 July, the USA Independence Day, ironically Calvin Coolidge came up. I had no idea that this president was born on this day and neither did I know anything about him. The other irony, I learned, is that this president was a staunch supporter of racial equality and women’s rights.
Maybe someone should remind The Supreme Court of this fact. I nominate Amanda Gorman for the job, whose style and presence has escalated since her iconic recital at Biden’s inauguration just 18 months ago. This is what she has to say in a powerful poem about the Roe v Wade debacle –
https://www.facebook.com/theamandagorman/videos/403995031443471
In this poem delivered in her now trademark punchy, “listen to me” style she echoes everything I said last week about power, control and patriarchy. She is Lilith and Pallas come to life, with her 1st House Lilith and Pallas conjunct her Descendant –
https://www.astrotheme.com/astrology/Amanda_Gorman
Back to Coolidge I found his biography absorbing, and tragic. He married at the age of 33 and had two sons. Calvin Coolidge paid the heaviest possible price for his success as in his second year of the presidency his youngest son blistered his foot when playing tennis on the courts at The White House. The blister developed into sepsis and Calvin Jnr died from blood poisoning at the age of 16. Coolidge never forgave himself for his son’s death and struggled with chronic depression for the rest of his life.
This shows clearly in his horoscope with the Sun – Saturn opposition in a T – Square to Chiron. The Sun is the life force, Saturn is the enemy of the Sun and is in the 5th House, where we locate children. Chiron is in the 8th House, where we locate death, and is the Wounded Healer. The mythology is that, unable to use his healing arts upon himself, Chiron gave up his god status in order to die and thereby end the eternal agony of a poisoned arrow wound (some accounts say to the left foot, others to the thigh).
As if to make up for this his other son lived to the age of 93, and Coolidge himself continued as President for another five years after the tragedy. In spite of his dreadful loss and depression he believed firmly in persistence (Sun – Saturn), but died suddenly from heart failure at the age of 60. As Elisabeth Brooke teaches in her herbal work our bodily organs don’t function just at a physical level, there is such a thing as “the emotional heart”.
SALLY KIRKMAN
Tennis & Synastry
Many of you will know that Sally has a long history of accurate predictions in all kinds of sports but she’s now said that she’s “retiring” from the tennis as all the new players dominating the scene are mostly without known times of birth.
This means that there’s no way of establishing the Ascendant (me) – Descendant (the other), the me/you horizon that pinpoints these Angles, crucial to all kinds of relationship astrology, including sports of the one to one variety.
So working with a horoscope without a time of birth is a bit like looking at a clock without hands on it, you can see all the planets but you don’t know their exact position on the wheel. However you can still do Synastry – the art of comparing two horoscopes to reveal areas of compatibility or conflict.
If you’re a tennis fan as I am then you will have been gripped by the stormy match on Saturday evening between Nick Kyrgios (born in Canberra, father Greek and mother Malay, unseeded) and the Greek player Stefanos Tsitsipas, the Number 4 Seed.
No times of birth for either player but birthdays are Nick Kyrgios 27 April 1995 and Stefanos Tsitsipas 12 August 1998. If you list one person’s planets (and Angles if you have them) on the left and the other person’s on the right you’ll see how they line up and compare to each other.
It’s widely known that Mars features strongly in the charts of sports people and, as the god of war, Mars is especially important in one to one combat, such as tennis. The nature of the red planet is heated, fiery, aggressive, passionate, competitive and ego driven, especially in his own sign of Aries (both players’ Moon sign) or in either of the other two fire signs – Leo or Sagittarius. Throw in the pride element with Leo and we can see that one player’s Mars exactly conjunct the other player’s Sun (obviously also fiery!) in Leo is a highly charged combination guaranteed to make the sparks fly.
Nick Kyrgios | Aspect | Stefanos Tsitsipas |
Mars 19 Leo | Conjunct | Sun 19 Leo |
Moon (between 0 – 12 Aries) | Conjunct | Moon (between 10 – 22 Aries) |
Sun 6 Taurus | Conjunct | Saturn 3 Taurus |
Kyrgios has been called the short-fused and hot headed (Aries) Aussie and nicknamed “the third commentator ” as he harangues himself and others during matches. This side to his nature was raging at full throttle in Saturday’s match, which was an astrological embodiment of Mars in Aries (on the day of the match Mars was at 27 Aries just separating from the square to Pluto at 27 Capricorn), Mars’ last aspect before changing sign tomorrow – the clash of the egos as well as a demonstration of why Mars rules this sign, ie the skill and brilliance of their athletic ability. The other factor in their synastry is Kyrgios’ Sun conjunct Tsitsipas’ Saturn (obstacles, barriers), a textbook combo for frustration.
At the time neither player was fined, and after the match the BBC commentators were not shy about saying how surprising this was. This included Martina Navratilova who went as far as saying that rules had been broken and that the umpire had been too lenient. Martina is also Moon Aries, conjunct her Aries Ascendant, but with Sun in “play fair” Libra in sextile to authority Saturn at 0 degrees of Sag. Don’t ever move the goalposts with a Saturnian.
This morning however I read that both players have now been fined. Kyrgios had already been fined $10,000 at this Wimbledon and a look at his Wikipedia page shows that being fined is by no means new to him. With the reasons ranging from unsportsmanlike behavior to outright verbal abuse over the last 7 years he’s approaching a staggering £700,000 mark for career fines. The figures speak for themselves.
WHAT’S HAPPENING THIS WEEK?
Talking of things getting heated we’re now into our usual heat wave temperatures for this time of year, stuck at around 36 degrees for the rest of this week at least and bracing ourselves for a “feels like” 39 on Wednesday. So this is going to be a brief blog!
We start with two personal planets changing sign within less than an half an hour of each other and then immediately aligning by the harmonious sextile – ie exactly two signs apart –
Tuesday 5 July
- Mars ingress Taurus 07.05
- Mercury ingress Cancer 07.26
- Mercury 0 Cancer sextile Mars 0 Taurus 07.38
Of the two Mars’ change of sign is the weightier as this planet has a 2 year cycle, twice the length of Mercury. You might think that this would neatly equate into Mars changing sign once every 2 months, but this is a hugely variable timescale because of Mars’ infrequent but very long retrograde loops.
To put that into sharper perspective Mars turns retrograde approximately once every 25 months for periods of around 65-80 days at a time, so nowhere near as frequent as Mercury (3 times a year, for 3 weeks at a time).
Mars Retrograde, the last two cycles and the next one coming up later this year –
- 26 June – 27 August 2018 – 9° Aquarius to 28° Capricorn
- 9 September – 13 November 2020 – 28° to 15° Aries
- 30 October 2022 – January 12 2023 – 25° to 8° Gemini
So the last time that Mars was in Taurus wasn’t two years ago but was in fact at the beginning of last year, 6 January – 4 March 2021. The next Taurus ingress will be in exactly two years time, in June 2024.
MARS IN TAURUS
Mars will be travelling through Taurus from now until 20 August. As I commented on recently, consecutive signs work as opposites so this is a huge shift of pace. Aries is Cardinal Fire – immediate, direct, no messing, do it now, burnout – whereas Mars in Taurus is Fixed Earth – the sign of the Bull, the plodder, going nowhere in a hurry, conserving energy, hates to be rushed, peaceable until provoked.
Mars is still Mars, still the god of war, still masculine and action loving, but these qualities can be compromised when expressed through Taurus, one of Venus’s signs and therefore one of Mars’s signs of detriment. Results are won through soldiering on, stubborn perseverance and determination, especially of the “I’ll prove you wrong” variety. So slow down and don’t underestimate the value of patience or subtlety. Don’t use a sledgehammer to crack a walnut.
MERCURY IN CANCER/CRITICAL DEGREES
Also note that today and tomorrow carry a transitional theme as two planets move from 29 degrees of one sign to 0 degrees of the next, both known as “critical degrees” because of the ending of one cycle and the beginning of another. In other words, pay close attention to what draws to an end for you and what begins.
As Mercury has only recently finished a retrograde loop (turned direct again 3 June) and won’t be making another one until 10 Sept (will turn retrograde at 9 Libra) this planet is therefore currently at full speed and will whizz through the whole of Cancer between now and 19 July.
As above, so below, this is significant news for anything connected to Cancerian concerns – family, home, property matters being at the top of the list. Things could move quickly or in an “over the top” way as Mercury’s first aspect on this new journey is the square to Jupiter –
Saturday 9 July
- Mercury 8 Cancer square Jupiter 8 Aries 07.15
I’ve already seen a showing for this as a friend in the UK has been offered the full asking price for her own house and then found the perfect place to move to. However there are 9 others in the queue for this beautiful property and final offers had to be in by end of play on Saturday. She made sure that her own offer was well over the asking price to give herself the best possible chance and should find out later today. As long as nobody else has gone even more over the top it will be hers and the move/transition will be made!
URANUS
The two other aspects that fall in the second half of this week both involve Uranus, another indication of things happening either quickly or unexpectedly –
Friday 8 July
- Venus 18 Gemini semi-sextile Uranus 18 Taurus 03.26
Sunday 10 July
- Sun 18 Cancer sextile Uranus 18 Taurus 09.40
The first is a minor aspect from Venus (love, money, pleasures) and the second is a major aspect from the Sun (life force, energy, health, illumination). The positive side to Uranus is spontaneity, and the enjoyment of friends and groups, so these are great aspects for our social life. Look out for anything with a theme of “different” and if you’re single and searching this is also a very promising picture for new faces and introductions. Uranus also favours online dating or socializing.
The flipside to Uranus is unpredictability – eg plans being changed or cancelled at the last minute. Stay flexible and go with plan B wherever necessary. The important thing is to clock that this is the Sun and Venus at work, not the heavy mob, so even changes that might seem irksome to begin with may well turn out to be somehow for the better.
Next week Venus links with Saturn and Neptune, wrapped around the Full Moon in Capricorn, and I’ll be talking about this more next time,
until then with love from Greece
Joanna