Willing to be empty While waiting to fill up ... the astrology of it

It's one of those nearly perfect days in the Pacific Northwest America.  The air is clean, the wind present, sky blue and though it's not warm it's pleasant.  Pete and JOTS and I are making changes here in the forest.  The blogs are changing and it's an organic progress.  For me, I am challenged to let there be empty space.  Pete is busy with lots of other things.  He is responsible.  He works out-side (tending to the poultry residents, washing his clothes in the Gals' house, maintaining everyday life which is substantial); he volunteers at the local Food Bank garden, and he has a 'job.'  His blog 'schedule' is his and we have one laptop between us, so sharing is a big part of life in a vardo and a Quonset.  Waiting is a big part of sharing.  Seems obvious but there have been times, too many, when I have either lost track of why I was waiting (some say that's the place where I had slid into denial) or forgot that I was waiting it had been so long. 

Saturn in Retrograde ... chew and spit, chew and swallow

working to maintain relationships with everyone under the sun is just plain stupid.

-Elsa P.

Saturn has become my main guy in the stars.  I've said that Saturn-rules my chart and plays a major and minor role in my life.  The task-master and task-maker is now retrograde in the sign of Libra.  Libra is very much about relationships, and relationships in balance/fair-trade/fair-play.  Saturn sees to things/lessons over time.  For those who are new or unfamiliar with astrology, another way to see the value of Saturn is to consider how we chew.  Like learning how to chew on things.  When we're babies, there's mother milk, warm, smooth and it goes down easy.  We get fed, and feel the love. Maybe the lesson of Saturn early on is to note how we suckle and appreciate the milk and the mother, or the bottle.  Not too much chewing involved.

When the solid food makes its way to the mouth, the gumming and the swallow connects with the provider of the goods in another way.  Appreciation and storing up the love goes somewhere.  Baby remembers.(actually, babies always remember)  Tick, tic, time passes and not every little thing tastes as good to baby and around 2 years old, the chew and spit, or chew and swallow scene starts to show up some likes and don't like.  Sometimes the terrible two might like the spoon-ful coming from the one with the smiling face and not the one with the big red eyes. 

Time passes some mo' and food and people, smells and sights start to impact the Saturn in us and our life lessons become a little clearer. 

"I like how she plays." 
"I don't like the way she takes all the toys." 
Photo credit


Questions come up.  "Why don't they share?"  "Why ain't I gett'n no respect?"

We notice what we do does something to the other kid.  We learn to be a friend, or we learn first who we like as friends and figure out how to keep 'em friends.  With Saturn in Libra at whatever age we are today, it matters that we look around and notice who likes us and who we like. 

If it smells like 'rat' it probably is.  If you have a sinking feeling in your stomach when you read something in your inbox ... it's probably a 'rat in' your messages.  Chew and spit!  Or, if you have a choice don't chew at all.

I'm an old woman with a few less teeth to chew with, and still I chew on somethings I ought not to have picked up in the first place. A recent experience had me fuss'n over something stuck in my old teeth.  An ally helped me spit it out.  I count that as a lucky thing:  the spitting out!

Saturn in retrograde is a rewind button on the friends, allies and wanabe associations in your circle.  If you've got old friends who continue to have your back, that's a great place to start.

Listen to Simon and Garfunkle sing:  "Old Friends/Bookends" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRJSoTbwzDk

Are you making good use of your chew and spit/chew and swallow reflexes?  Do you know who your true allies are, and are you keeping them happy?



PART TWO of Relationships : The potential of The Composite Chart/Report for a couple living with MCS

What is a Composite Chart?

Elsa Panizzon, author and creator of the astrology blog Elsa Elsa.com describes a Composite Chart this way,

"As for calculating a composite chart, there are various ways but most common is to take the midpoint between the two Suns and that becomes the Composite Sun. The midpoint between the Moons becomes the Composite Moon, etc. I like this method probably due the Libra in my chart as the two individuals meet in the middle and this becomes the relationship. :)"


Why Astrology?

The short answer is why not. 
Astrologer Liz Greene from Astro.co presented a seminar given on April 27, 1997  "One and one equals three Relationships and how to survive them."  I found the seminar in print while researching this article for VardoForTwo.  The entire seminar on The Composite Chart by Liz Greene can be found here.  Part of Greene's work is used here to set the stage for viewing the relationship that includes the challenges of living with MCS (Multiple Chemical Sensitivities).  Greene said:

The composite doesn't seem to describe what either person feels about the other...When we are looking at a composite chart, we are not exploring what two people activate in each other or feel about each other. We are interpreting the energy field they generate between them. The composite chart is like a child, a third entity which carries the genetic imprints of both parents but combines these imprints in an entirely new way and exists independently of either of them...

My motives for digging into the composite chart as a form of navigation stem from the very real and often times confusing cross-roads Pete and I find ourselves at over and over again.  One of my favorite readings from the book Courage to Change reminds me that confusion can sometimes be a gift. "Looking back on instances when I felt desperately in need of an immediate solution, I can see that often I wasn't ready to act. When I became fully ready, the information I needed was there for the taking."

We are not a young couple starting a new relationship.  We are instead a couple in our 60's who came together late in life, and with us we brought a life-time of energy and history, and modes of thinking and behaving.  Seven years ago, a boatload of challenges pulled up with our names on it.  The boatload is often more than we can understand or tolerate without help. 

It has been my choice to seek out astrology as a compass when inner guidance seems mis-placed.  Since the intent of the Composite Chat/Report is to 'interprete the energy field (two people) generate between them' I saw this as an opportunity.  All relationships generate an energy field between them.  The added dimension of a relationship coping and managing the effects of MCS with its changing manifestations deserves all the insight available.    Astrology and the Composite Chart of two people living with the choices of others (and who among us doesn't) is a means to make sense of things that are beyond our control, and like all spiritual paths, there are so many ways to get there from here. Rather like redirecting the energy we have used trying to fight the illness, tools like this Composite Report aids in recovering and shoring up from the effects of the illness.

The bones of this article is the Composite Report prepared for Pete and me by Elsa Panizzon from the astrology blog ElsaElsa.com.  Elsa did not calculate and narrate the report personally. She uses the software available to her to do the composite, and provides this service at a price affordable for many, including us.  I have culled the report and used particular aspects, planet positions and narration to shed light on the way our relationship might respond to episodes, exposures and challengres specific to our journey with MCS. 

Our journey in VardoForTwo is a boatload of experiences that could benefit  from insight we might otherwise mis-understand as oppression without cause.  The Composite Report that follows points out and lays out the combined energy and talents from a broad view.  It helps to see what others see in you, sometimes it's tough to get that vantage point when you're busy bailing water.