I've finally figure out why even though I love astrology and have quite a bit of faith in the workings of the universe I absolutely can't read it all the time anymore.
Everything that's written (everything, in fact, that's written on any subject) is written by someone else. It's someone else's perception and interpretation and ultimately, anything that is someone else's is hard to make your own. And ofcourse you can relate to it but it still never feels like your own.
I think I am very disappointed in my capability to express myself sometimes. And I'm very impressed by people who are confident that what they're saying is a precise and authentic expression of what they mean.
For me everything starts with a feeling and feelings, you may have noticed, are notably difficult to change into words.
This is also why I don't want to interpret astrology (and why I sometimes just don't want to talk to anyone even though I have to) because I'm sometimes not sure I'll use the right words.

It's the Little Things

Much as I love shoes I think I might love cheap rubber flips flops even more. I always have a pair and wear them until they break or are totally worn through. My most recent pair was nearly both and everytime I left the house in them (they are my favorite walking and hiking shoes, truly) I would think "These look like the shoes of a homeless person who is about to be a shoeless person". In fact, for the last couple weeks I've been wondering if they would break when I was out and leave me walking home barefoot (it's happened before). For the last few months I've been trying to no avail to replace them, I mean they're only $3-$5. I looked everywhere: the Chinese grocery, Target, Walgreen's, the 99cents store. Everywhere I looked they were either out of my size or they only had some that weren't the right kind -I don't want to wear flip flops with rhinestones on the strap spelling out "babe" and really I don't want any embellishments at all. I don't mind if they're a color (I love the two tone kind that have a white upper sole and a colored sole with straps in the same color) but my favorite are just the plain black. Anyway, I can't believe I haven't found a pair that were even passable for months. It's summer!!! They should be everywhere.
Today I was thinking about my flip flops a lot because I walked to the library and then also took the dogs for a long walk/hike combo and each time I left I wondered if I should change into the cheap sandals I bought as an alternate (but don't really like or find as comfortable as flip flops) but I didn't. And as I rounded a corner walking my dogs there was a little shopping bag at the edge of the sidewalk outside an apartment. It had a little sign on it that said "free" and right on top were a pair of black rubber flip flops. I saw them but at first wasn't going to take them. I have small feet and most people don't wear my size so I figured they'd probably be way too big. But my dog stopped to sniff around and I decided to go back and take a look. I pulled them out and checked the size but it was Brazilian (?) so I tried them on. Perfect fit. Funny thing. They're brand new and quite a bit sturdier built than the ones I usually find (or maybe they just seem that way because the ones I was wearing were so worn out). I tossed my old ones in the first trash can I found and have been wearing these ever since.
I love that this happened. It's one of those things that makes me feel like the universe cares about me. So simple but so perfect.

My love life's been something between a disaster and dead in the water for quite some time now but recently I've seen it perking up again. Only trouble is that I'm so out of practice that I think I keep screwing it up because I'm so stunned at the possibility. Faced with what appears to be a genuinely interested guy the little voice inside my head says, "What, ME? This guy? This super nice incredibly handsome guy? He likes me? You think?"
Every time I realize too late that maybe I wasn't responding with the proper amount of enthusiasm to convey that the interest is mutual it's too late and I spend at least a week trying to imagine that we meet again by chance the same way we met before. But we usually don't. Until my most recent flirt. I have to admit that as truly nice as he seems to be and as much as he seems open and interested I'm needing a little convincing and was totally prepared to give it the time as he was so conveniently located in the building next to where I was working but then I quit that job.
Yup. Foiled again. I am, in fact, writing this with one intention only: to embarrass myself out of possibly of leaving a note on his car. I've heard stories of people doing things like that with excellent outcomes but it's usually the guy. Also, I always like to believe that what's meant to happen will happen no matter the circumstances. And, although I've given up on believing in 'predictions' of any kind from any person, I still want to believe in the guy who will "pursue me without fear or shame" as someone once told me. And maybe I'm also reminding the universe that I'm patiently waiting for another opportunity, if not with this one then bring on the next!
The bottom line is that being between jobs and not independently wealthy is kind of dull. The mind wanders and ill conceived plots are... well, conceived.

Arrrrgh! So with my latest revelations on my birthchart comes this: the realization that my true node is in the 9th house changed EVERYTHING. That's the house of travel, philosophy and mind expansion -all of which I love and desire. I've been dying to travel forever and haven't much been able to and it's one of my always goals in life. This is great because the whole concept of the north node is what you should be doing in life that doesn't always feel comfortable (though I have no trouble with philosophy or mind expansion and the only real trouble I have with travel is funding it). But I realized, while in my car and away from my computer, today that I didn't know what the house opposite that was (which is where the south node is -what you feel comfortable with, what comes easily, etc.) and it turns out it's the 3rd house which is communication, glibness and the desire to write. Interesting.... I think it's also defined as the house of self expression which is a bit broader. But I have to say I can't now decide if writing is a waste of time (it's comforting when I'm lonely and bored, as I am now, in between jobs again this week and without much human contact) or just a fine way to pass the time until I can create north node themed opportunities for myself. As is usual with these realizations, first comes clarity and then the confusion returns...

Astro Rant

Reading something just now prompted me to look at the my natal chart with the current transits. I've been wondering for ages now how a generally written for everyone forecast can be accurate for me (or anyone else for that matter) as in my chart the signs and houses don't line up quite as they traditionally are drawn. In fact, all my excitement about having Neptune and Chiron finally move on from Aquarius to Pisces -perhaps it's not exactly as definitive as I thought it was as they're both now in my 1st house (the whole of Pisces being inside my 1st house) which is the house of 'self'.
The interesting thing I'm looking at right now is that for the past year I've been hearing that Jupiter was in my house of home and that maybe I would move or do huge renovations and the like and in truth I didn't have the opportunity or ability to do any of those things. But suddenly now, with Jupiter smack in the middle of my 4th house, NOT in my 5th house as general horoscopes are saying, my apartment building nearly went into foreclosure (a few months ago) and the landlord has just had workers here for the last week repainting the entire exterior, repairing the crumbly stairs and fixing up a couple of nasty bits in my apartment that he'd been neglecting for years. THAT is totally Jupiter in my 4th house and so is the possibility of moving once the place has sold (whenever that happens....).
Also, I just realized that although I'm being told that Pluto has been transiting my 12th house, it's actually in my 11th (ruling groups and community) which explains why these areas have been going through cycles of tearing down and rebuilding for years now.
I have to admit, with all the attention I pay to this stuff I'm always surprised at how I can suddenly see things all at once in a moment (as now) that I couldn't see for years and years of staring at my chart and transits. It's all become clear! And I'm quite relieved to find that my True Node is in the 9th house and not the 10th as I'd been thinking all this time -how do I overlook these things?! (And THIS is why I'm reluctant to do readings.) It makes so much more sense, I'm not the type to believe that my career is my life (indicated by a 10th house placement) but I crave major travel (9th house) and have been working quite hard at overcoming a tendency toward logic for my sometimes nonsensical and elusive but strong and accurate intuition which is very 9th house vs. 3rd house (and which just guided me to quit my job BEFORE having secured the next because I just KNOW it's actually all going to work out and it was best for me to get the hell out of there asap). How strange that I can suddenly see everything all the better... Does this happen to everyone? I should look for the aspect illustrating this moment.

A "bad" life only makes a "good" story if it's absolutely tragic.
I've been thinking about the expanse of my entire life lately, in an attempt to convince myself that some things actually can and do change magnificently and profoundly in a lifetime. I'm trying to convince myself about one particular area, actually. I don't know anyone less lucky in love than me -not that anyone's ever physically beaten me or anything equally awful. But that's just what I mean. Not only have I not particularly enjoyed my love life but it doesn't even make for an exciting story. And since I feel I've never gotten anywhere near what I wanted I can't quite imagine it turning around suddenly when the whole concept that it exists seems scarce enough.
People say that the way you feel about your relationship to love is the same story as the way you feel about your relationship to money.
I'm trying to work out some new relationships to both.
Seems to me, if I can do it with one the other simply follows.

What does it mean to dream of rooms and room full of old furniture? These things are not in my dictionary of symbolism. And by "rooms full" I mean warehouses full of furniture that is not only throughout the room but then stacked up. Imagine tall sandwiches of old sofa's, like they've been through the car crusher -they sit atop each other so flush.
I once saw a big flat bed semi truck on the freeway loaded up with flattened cars. It was beautiful.

There was a while there where Pinterest was all I needed to escape. Just arranging pretty images and great quotes would recharge me a bit from the icks of ordinary life but it doesn't seem to be working quite the same lately.
First off, I'm working again. And that doesn't mean the same thing that it used to. On the one hand I absolutely love what I'm doing and I'm really happy with the choice I made. On the other, one of the many trials that it's brought about for me is actually understanding in my brain that I am now a professional hair stylist. I just realized it again today when I went to buy more feather razor blades. I pulled out my professional "club" card for the store and it struck me that this is what I am. I'm sure it sounds ridiculous but it's kind of a weird ongoing inner battle to accept it all.
On top of that I've been co-fostering a stray I found a few weeks ago. It was one of those amazing experiences in which I acted entirely on instinct without thinking anything through and it all went beautifully. Now, ofcourse, there are things coming up that need to be dealt with -proper training and emotional support, most specifically- and it's like trying to parent with a partner whose style is really incompatible with your own. Which creates another weird inner battle for confidence in my dog rearing style and beliefs as the only thing that's important to me is that the dog comes away from us better than when I found him -and he was pretty much an angel when I found him. How do you tell someone kind, generous and loving that he's capable of turning the sweetest dog ever into a nervous, dominant aggressive wreck?

I think I'm a little lovesick over someone I don't even know. So what else is new, right?
It was one of those chance meetings with a short conversation and the kind of eyes that let you see just enough of something lovely to make you think there's a whole lot more in there. What to do, what to do.......

I really want to read all about what the astrologers are writing about the first exact Pluto Uranus square yesterday now that it's passed but it's still all stuff from before it happened AND it's making me feel a little weird. 

In my experience, the interpretations of aspects change a little once they passed. There's a shift in perspective, the experience itself. Prior to the experience they're writing about comparisons to history and previous experiences that may have been similar or personal. It all changes.

I know that I've finally pinpointed a few things in terms of perspective and stuff. I've kind of figured out more of what it is I've been working on, where it's headed and how it's going for me. 

Last night I had a dream of a climbing journey to get home. I found one of my neighbors at the bottom of a flight of stairs like the ones that do climb the hill to the street I live on but in the dream they were steeper. As I was climbing the steps ahead of me were very close to my face, almost as if they were a ladder leaned against the side of the building. I clung to the railing equally pulling myself up and climbing with my legs. At the top of the stairway I found myself on the side of a very tall mountain with a ledge/path around the side of it. While the stairway had been lush on both sides and seemingly enclosed this path was completely exposed on one side and very, very high up. I stayed down close to the ground and the neighbor I was with reminded me of a few of my old guy friends from teenage years, mellow and just there to be a good companion. Supportive but not pushy. I told him the height was hard for me, I had vertigo and I was scared that maybe I couldn't make it all the way to my house. I  felt like I knew the way and knew it was waiting there for me somewhere but it didn't feel like a familiar route though it seemed to be the only route. He said it was ok, we'd take a break and that he had some pot and that would make me feel braver (which does sound like one or two of those old guy friends). We paused on the ledge path and he showed me the safest place to sit. I knew I'd be ok, I knew I'd make it, I was just at that scary spot. It was a good feeling dream.
Today is the first Pluto Uranus square of a series which will happen over the course of the next few years. I know it's a big deal, I know it's going to make something happen but I don't really know what it is yet. There are a lot of things happening in my life right now that would have once been terrifying to me. It's an interesting time. But I'm dealing and I'm getting greater and braver. These are, in fact, the kinds of times I wish for when I'm bored and nothing has changed in too long. I guess we'll see what really happens and whether or not it feels particularly difficult or if I really notice it much at all. Sometimes we're so open and ready that changes are easy, they happen smoothly.

There are all kinds of jobs in the world -when you really think about it. I just came to this conclusion after starting here: It seems like everything we do in this world is about finding a way to sell something to others. Seems like in the U.S. at least, we're just one big huge retail store. I was just thinking about all the projects the city is doing in my neighborhood lately: fixing up the park and the lake, widening streets. I realized that no matter how inconvenient, this is one of the things we do actually need done -repair to our wider personal environment. The streets need to be in good shape to drive on them safely, the parks are an amenity AND a necessity to it's best to keep them in good shape, too. And, when I think of the economy, all of this work requires labor which provides income for families. And since what we need, apparently, is people working and making money this is a good thing.
I started to think of the other ways I see the economy being created around me: companies building new townhouses to sell to the people who have jobs because they're working. This is where I started to get disappointed because I realized that this process spirals down all the way to the 99cents store. You know? On some level or another we've made everything into a price tag and many have lost touch with nature entirely (that's a whole other thought process I was doing today -how distant many people are from nature and how different a place the world would be if that weren't so- I personally find it an even more interesting topic but this is what I started). That if there were more jobs that were about understanding nature and preserving it we wouldn't be in such a mess to begin with. I started thinking about the differences in qualifications for the different jobs: city worker, builder, oceanographer, environmental impact, erh, person. Education.
The only thing that's offered free to us in our whole lives, funded by the government is public school until we're 18.
After that the government shoves us out into the world to be an adult. Everything costs money including extending your education. You arrive at a certain young age and suddenly a whole bunch of laws change allowing you to do many grown up things requiring a lot of decision making. What a stupid cluster of events to happen at the same time. Maybe it's just  me but that could potentially be kind of... flooding.
Anyway, I can go on like this but maybe you get the picture. Basically I'm just trying to see myself what an insane revolution we're in for if everybody goes back to using local markets, local farms, bicycles, etc. What if "people" put significantly more money into education. The kind of money that would enable us to train and afford really amazing teachers. And the kind that would enable to people to acquire more education for a lot less or free. Imagine what people would discover about themselves and become. Imagine the diversity of jobs. Imagine the social classes melting together..... Imagine everyone having enough of all that they need. Imagine the balance. Imagine how much we would all love each other if we didn't have all these lines of demarcation.

The day after I passed my test I realized that even though I'd felt it was a given I still felt a lot of satisfaction at having gotten through school and the exam. I started trying to think of other things that I wanted to accomplish but the only thing that really came to mind is the promise I made to myself that once I was working I really wanted to start planning for a trip as I haven't really traveled much in recent years. But that's not really the same thing.
The other day as I was heading home from the exam I passed a scooter dealership. For the last couple years, and especially the last year, I've been perusing ads for used mopeds because it just sounds like a fun way to get around. I've never gotten much further than that, partly because at some point I go through this thought process, "A moped seems safer than a bicycle, so a motorcycle (or a scooter) seems like it would be safer than a moped. So I should really just get a motorcycle (or a scooter)."Then I start researching the motorcycle safety class and then I put the whole thing on hold because anything but a moped is a considerable investment.
So when I saw all the shiny new scooters the other day I thought, "This is the present I want for getting my cosmetology license."
This evening I went on the DMV website to see what you needed to do to get a motorcycle license and read through the handbook a bit which was horrifying. The entire thing is an illustrated guide to all the ways that you are invisible and at peril. Add to that I'm living in Los Angeles which is home to some of the most self absorbed drivers and it got me thinking a second time. But that's almost my favorite thing. To find something that starts to scare me a little bit and learn how to get over it. Getting over fear is just learning how to become stronger and I love to be strong and fearless. So I think this is my next goal: to get my motorcycle license.

I've never been known for my patience and that's why I'm going to look at a new house this afternoon. Even though I haven't quite started at my new job (hopefully this week, I'll find out on Tuesday for sure), even though if I wait until my current place changes ownership I could receive a very healthy relocation fee, even though I already drove by this place yesterday and it's not exactly what I think I want (only because the front yard is soooo small that it's basically right on the street and because it's only one bedroom and I want two). But it's got a washer and dryer and a FIREPLACE!!!! And it's on a street that is basically like a pocket -all dead ends- and it's right near the very end, so it's pretty secluded from traffic and such. And it does have a "breakfast nook" which could easily double as a space to sew and make jewelry and such -which is what I would use a second bedroom for. So a big part of me is really excited about it. Oh, and it's a little craftsman style bungalow with lot's of nice wood trim and built in cabinets and big windows so in that way it's exactly what I love. Anyway! I'm really excited about it even though at this point in my long stretch of unemployment I have no money saved to move and I honestly wonder what landlord wants to see that I haven't worked in the last year (even thought I'm about to start again)... But I can't help myself, I have to go look and if it's meant to be then it will somehow all work out really easily and if it's not meant to be then something even better will turn up when I'm actually ready to move. And that is what I have to remember: when something doesn't work out it means there's always something better.

Well I passed my exam the other day and am now a licensed cosmetologist. I've also got a chair with my name on it (metaphorically, ofcourse) waiting for me at a salon I love which means that this whole stretch of unemployment and re-creation is coming to a close.
Whether or not it's having put the test behind me and knowing that things are nearly settled up ahead, I've felt a huge shift in the last couple weeks. I also attribute it to the energy cleanse I did as prescribed by the... hmm, I don't know what she is... best guess by her methods is Santeria priestess? Anyway, I visited her a few weeks ago as she had made some predictions for me a couple years back that seemed really, nearly impossible to me at the time but which have been steadily unfolding in my life since.
Anyway, on this visit I just wanted to see what she might tell me as sort of reassurance that I had in fact been making the choices that were right for me rather than simply doing the only things I could think of -when things are easy it makes me wonder if I was supposed to have done something else. This was before I again realized that life is supposed to be easy (most times) and that when I'm doing what's right for me opportunities come without seemingly insurmountable challenges. I figured that if I there was anything amiss (maybe this whole hair thing wasn't really the right career? maybe the job I had asked for and been given wasn't at the right place?) I was happy to hear that her predictions for my near future were the same ones she'd predicted (minus all the things that have already happened) the last time I saw her, and this time I accepted the prescription she offered me and I tell you I've felt a huge shift in my energy and seen a huge difference in who and what comes through my world.
I also realized, with all the talk about the recent Venus transit of the Sun, that what was going on for me 8 years ago when the last one occurred was that I was in the midst of my first attempt to get into this career. Which was slightly challenging due to a bunch of other stuff going on in my life but at which time I was given a few really good opportunities, as well. Unfortunately back then I had a lot less faith (maybe none) in my ability to bring in money and I felt that circumstances were far too challenging to make the leap from my very stable and "secure" job and this new thing that was like starting from scratch and totally uncertain. Part of me wishes that I had done it then -perhaps the last 8 years would have been a lot better and a lot easier, I certainly would have avoided a ton of hideous shit but I also wouldn't be who I am now. Funny to hear myself say that sometimes, it's a twisty path that brings you to realize how much you love who you are.
There are still a couple more bits of this near future which have been predicted which have shown signs but haven't quite arrived yet that I'm looking forward to and wondering just how they'll end up finally coming around, because boy am I ready for some more changes but I guess I'll just have to be patient...

Tomorrow I take my State Board exam and become a licensed cosmetologist (that is, assuming I pass -which I am). I'm so ready to have it over with that yesterday I was wishing it could've been today and today I'm not even nervous that it's tomorrow. Not even about my 4:30 a.m. alarm because I realized that I'm so rested right now that I'm never tired. What I'm thinking about more than the test, actually, is the fact that after tomorrow I will be ready to start working which will mean this last period of "vacation" is over. I was kind of surprised, actually, at how much I enjoyed this one -with school out of the way and a better idea of what my future will be it was a lot easier to relax and not stress about things than last spring when I didn't know if unemployment would give me benefits, didn't know what kind of job I'd end up with, didn't know if unemployment would let me go to school, and so on. I did a lot more projects last spring when the bank account was a little fluffier, which was fun and important as I needed to keep my hands and my mind busy so as not to worry so much about the aforementioned uncertainties, but while this last stretch was a somewhat "broke" one it was super relaxing and enjoyable as I kind of knew what it was leading to and felt better about relaxing into it rather than working through it.
It's been an interesting time, this period since early last year until now. I realized the other day how much my ideas about work and how to make money have changed and those have been big changes for me. Yesterday I was watching a video on Style Like U (the link takes you to the profile I was watching, actually, because I just adore this guy) and just after I finished it I realized that it had been a long time since I'd wondered how artists and other 'self-employed' (basically) people manage to make a living and feel secure in professions that seem sort of unpredictable and in which the sole responsibility to bring in income is their own. I always remember what Joseph Campbell said about his own work and life, that when you're doing what you want to be doing and should be doing, "doors would open where there were none -where there wouldn't be doors for someone else". (Maybe that's not the exact quote....) And sure, maybe I didn't get to go to Vidal Sassoon on scholarship or something but I realized very quickly that it wouldn't have been what I wanted anyway. The most amazing thing to me this last year was that I was allowed to not work (sort of...) and that I was allowed to choose how I wanted to recreate my life. There was a time I wouldn't have believed that I would be given the opportunity to do all this or that my decisions would have been supported in a way that made it so easy and for all of that I am endlessly grateful.

Overnight Lunar Eclipse

Holy crap. That lunar eclipse last night messed me up! First of all I didn't realize that it was happening over night, I've not been on top of the astro lately because lately I've just felt that I didn't really want much influencing me about what's going on in my life and anytime I read a lot of other peoples interpretations of the sky I know that I try to relate to it and the results are that I feel like I'm living less authentically.
Anyway, I'm also preparing for my licensing exam later this week so probably minimizing the variety of information I'm absorbing right now is for the best. If it's not about anatomy, electricity, nail diseases, hair structure or chemistry I just don't have brain space for it at the moment.
Last night I had the worst insomnia I've had in ages. Not only could I not sleep and not only was my brain  running like crazy, it was dredging up all these memories and assessments of the past (from recent to way back) that were really dull and unsettling for me. It's not like I was thinking of the 'good old times', it's like I was thinking of the really nice guy I dated briefly when I was 23 and wondering all over again why I the whole experience had felt so boring at the time and why, now, I felt that I had somehow missed an opportunity to be with someone who treated me the way I actually would like to be treated (took me on proper dates, bought me a birthday gift even though we'd only been out a couple times when it came around, etc.). And ALL of the memories were like that, of sort of ambivalent themed experiences. I think I hate ambivalent relationship experiences even more than I hate heartbreaking experiences -there's something amazing that happens first in order to be heartbroken.
Anyway, it was an incredibly rough night for me and even though I was sure it did have something to do with the full moon and the eclipse, since I didn't know that the eclipse actually happened early this morning I thought that it might have been equally some kind of oncoming anxiety about my test which until then I'd been feeling totally confident about. But suddenly I was thinking: dear god, what if I can't sleep at ALL this week?!
So this morning I'm kind of relieved. I'm actually really impressed now at the power of that eclipse -that was far more insane at the actual time than the solar eclipse two weeks ago. Thank god it's over.

A friend likes to tell how his father, when asked to help fix or explain a problem on the farm where he grew up, would always respond, “Just look at it.” Lee generally says something like this when asked how his photographs work or why he made them. And he means it in the same spirit. First, if you don’t figure it out for yourself you will quickly forget what you discover and it won’t be of any use to you. And second, don’t use somebody else’s way of looking or you won’t see anything. To the close observer, Friedlander even builds in safeguards to keep his audience from seeing his way.

— Rod Slemmons, Lee Friedlander: Just Look At It

I just posted this quote on facebook (even though I dislike facebook more and more everyday) because I especially loved the part that says "don't use somebody else's way of looking or you won't see anything" (which I also pointed out in my post). 

What happened next was the perfect example of why I hate facebook. 

A relative of mine who is being raised suuuuper Christian and suuuper sheltered "like"-ed it. This is someone who (at an age too young to know much of anything about the world, especially considering the world she's living in) posted a while back a long, hideous "letter" to an unborn fetus as a "political" (read: religious conservative) statement for pro-life. Even more than the offense of the letter itself, I was offended that someone of her position felt she had the authority or experience to post something like that but because I remember being young and wanting to be provocative and interesting I simply blocked all of her posts from that point on. I generally don't see activity from her on my posts either and thank god for that because her "like" just annoyed the crap out of me. How in the hell does someone who posts shit like that dare to say that they can relate to seeing with their own eyes?! And then I realized the danger of scary people, they all believe that they've come to these opinions and decisions on their own. They believe themselves to be informed and experienced. 

I have hoped for years, and continue to, that at least one of the children of this family would be incredibly rebellious. Is that evil? I don't wish for anything bad to happen to any of them and I do want them all to be happy, but it would delight me to see just one of them turn up with ideas from outside what they've been told to believe in. It would be equally delightful if one of them grew up to be gay. 

All that venting aside, the original reason I really loved this quote is because I've never liked the part of art where someone tells you that you have to be able to explain why you made it or why you like it. I like this attitude of "Just look at it." If you're not getting anything from it, you're not going to. I very much believe that most great artists make art simply because they felt an urge inside themselves that wanted to be expressed. People don't always know why they feel how they do or why they do what they do. Life is not logical.

I'm in a stuck spot but not really stuck. I think this is all just Venus retrograde (which I can't wait to be over, I'm realizing). It's purgatory, where I am I mean, not Venus retro -although perhaps Venus retro is purgatory... I'm about a week from my test date and being able to officially accept a job (and I just might have one lined up!) and until then I have little to do but study and walk dogs and clean house and watch Mad Men from the beginning (I never tried to get into it before and finally started it from the beginning, I think I'm on season four now).
For some reason (actually, I know exactly why but am not going to tell why) I feel like I know what's coming next, in a very general way, and knowing what I do makes me not want to put specifics to it. It may be the first time in my life that I've been incredibly comfortable just waiting for everything to start rolling in, partly because I'm expecting nothing less than the best, and surprising me with the details and actualities. I have zero attachment to anything specific right now and it's a strange place to be. And, unfortunately, sort of uninspiring. I feel as if, in fact, what I'm waiting for will be the inspiration for what is coming -they're one and the same. Also, I finally really "got" the whole: if you have to try then it's not the right thing and it's great but the excitement of things happening easily is not the same.
One little teaser I will tell is that the other day when I went to see a movie and had to wait half an hour for the next show because the one I wanted was sold out I found, in the lobby book shop, a dream dictionary. I've been looking for a good one for a while, so many of them are ridiculous, and so I checked out a couple of bits of a dream I had recently that made me wonder for a while. In the dream I came across a mother cat with all her kittens at her belly. I dream of cats a lot so they never surprise me but I was a little saddened as in this dream the cats seemed stray and not in quite perfect health. And while they didn't seem really sick or to be injured they were covered in flies. For some reason, though, I didn't think it would be right to disturb the flies -wave them away or something- plus there were so many, it seemed almost that I wouldn't be able to do anything about it and so I didn't know what to do about it at all.
I looked up flies in my dictionary of symbolism and found something about them representing "the ceaseless quest" -that's the most I could make of it. 'Cats' I've read a number of times and I still can't say I have a clear idea of what they represent, especially as in so many cultures and mythologies they're regarded so differently -sometimes evil, sometimes exalted, I don't know what to make of it. But this dictionary had multiple meanings for cats depending on the situation in the dream, including what it means to help an injured cat (many of my dreams have been of me trying to care for herds of sick and injured cats) and I don't remember exactly what it said anymore (I didn't buy the book -yet) but it was really good and made sense. Dreaming of flies, however, really stood out as it concerned achievement and said that the more flies, the greater the achievement. Ultimately it all lines up with what I already know about my near future (yes, "know" and no, I'm still not telling) and I suddenly understood better the emotional content of the dream and felt it lining up with how I've been feeling awake in the last week or so. So now I'm just waiting and waiting and waiting for it all to begin...

Last week I finally found out my test date for the licensing exam I need to take before I can start working. Considering it a followed a scare in which I mistakenly thought for a few hours that my unemployment benefits had been prematurely cut off (and for some people out there this has happened and I feel for them) I was quite relieved. I'd been expecting it to be in June and had set my head on the idea that I'd be working for sure by the end of June.
Last night I had my first anxiety dream. Not about the test, surprisingly, but about working in a salon. The dream, in fact, was not "bad" in the sense that anything went wrong -it was a dream about giving a haircut, that's all. But for some reason, up until now, when I've given a haircut I've felt somehow protected by my status as a novice/student. I realized that in a few short weeks I'll be a "professional" and that's that.
I woke up from the dream, actually was woken by my dog who's been asking to go out in the wee hours lately, and had a million revelations about school and why I'm glad it's over. The dream wasn't the intense kind that completely saturate your senses. It was murky and dim and dark and vague, but the anxiety was the intense kind that completely saturates your senses and it was hard to shake off.
This morning when I woke up feeling the way you feel after a night like that and additionally feeling like my life is moving too slow and I'm still losing time to all this waiting. And then I suddenly remembered some bits of last spring when I started this whole transition. And I remembered that this is me starting my entire life over again. It's easy to forget when it takes so long. It's easy to become complacent when all I seem able to do is wait and roll with the occasional wave of progress, which come very slowly and so far apart. If things were moving faster I might feel overwhelmed and crazed but at least I'd see the progress and feel like I was getting somewhere. But suddenly they are moving faster (which I think is what was promised by astrologers at this beginning of the year -the first half might go slow but we'd hit June and it would all pick up -or was that supposed to be last year?) and I can see development in sight. I remembered too that I could have just gotten another job, not a career, a job. A job that probably would have made me miserable right from the start, which wouldn't have provided me with any kind of future or even enough income to support myself properly for the first few years. This may be a struggle in many ways, and there's no question I'm starting from scratch but it's got more potential for happiness and success than anything else I can think of and once again I'm happy that I went this way despite the waiting and the uncertainty. When you're doing what's right for yourself everything works out better than you could have expected and I know it's all about to start working out better than I could have expected. Finally.

Spiritualized - Little Girl

Saturday: the Full Moon, Noticeable Changes in My Neighborhood and Other Stuff

Last night was the full moon in Scorpio. A full moon in and of itself usually creates a lot of noticeable chaos in the neighborhood -especially falling on a Saturday AND Cinco de Mayo but last night was noticeably still and quiet for pretty much any day of the year (except most Sundays, most Sunday nights are quiet as hell). Here's the thing: it's not that I don't like peace and quiet. In fact, I don't particularly love the craziness that can come with some full moons, but for a Cinco de Mayo to be so quiet? No neighborhood parties blaring music and loud kids all afternoon and into the night? It's just unreal. And, to me, kind of depressing. That's part of what feels like home to me. Not that I listen to Ranchero music (or even really know what any other types of popular Latino music are called...) but when I hear it I know I'm home. It leads me to the confusing spot I find myself in often: What exactly bothers me about this? The fact that I wasn't trying desperately to block the sounds of loud music all night after six days of noisy construction sounds? The fact that the dog wasn't running down to the fence between my yard and my neighbors to bark and stare at them through the small open space because he can smell their barbeque? The fact that I didn't have to close the windows to keep the barbeque smoke out of my house? But there's something lovely about the sounds of the neighborhood parties and the feeling of all their energy in the air. I think the bottom line is that it's just duller this way.
Sort of related but not really is that I just read a book (fiction) about a North American girl whose parents are diplomats. She was born in Cuba but grew up in various countries and learns at 13, when her mother is dying, that her real father in Cuban. After college she goes to Cuba to find him and I'm not going to ruin anything about the story so that's all I'm saying. Read it, it's called Dirty Blonde and Half-Cuban (by Lisa Wixon). Anyway, the story is great and I love her voice but what was most interesting for me was my overly emotional response to the book. I think partly because the timing coincided with the full moon and all but it brought up a lot of interesting things for me including the contrast of the character of Cuba in relation to the character of the US (and then, personalizing it for myself, the character of my little hood). I'm not even going to begin to complain about any specifically North American things but I have to admit that I got really excited about the idea of living a life not centered on capitalism. The resulting hustle to get by doesn't frighten me in the least, in a way it's how I've been living for the last year and a half (and sort of off and on most of my adult life as I've rarely been in a position where I was even reasonably comfortable financially). I love the attitude she describes Cubans as having about their circumstances and the way she tells of them living with so much joy and loving their country in spite of it all. I have to say it all made me feel 97% ready to run off to Cuba forever -if only I could get my dogs and cat there- except that nearly all of the women prostitute themselves in order for their families to survive and I'm just not up for that.
I'm feeling bored this evening and wishing for some kind of adventure. At my age these are harder and harder to come by locally since so much less is shocking or new. It's been a long time since I felt I was wandering into the unknown and I'm ready for a big trip somewhere soon.... Hopefully somewhere beautiful and warm with lot's of dilapidated but beautiful old buildings -my favorite kind of architecture.

This afternoon I was outside with my dog when a teensy baby finch tumbling down the sidewalk to my feet. As I was figuring out what the hell was happening he fluttered and tumbled off the sidewalk into the long grass where he got stuck. For this purpose precisely I have a bird cage that sits vacant in my house which I picked up for ten bucks at a thrift store a few months back. So I made him a little nest out of shredded washcloth and a small box and wired the doors open and tied it to the awning on my back porch. I've been sitting here watching out the window to see if his parents will find him ever since, nervous at what might happen if they didn't. He's been chirping away.
Just a minute ago finally someone caught on and perched on the porch railing just across from him before flying over and perching in the open door of the cage. He was joined by about four others just after. Baby got super excited about this fluttering and chirping, and now they know where he is and I can relax.

How do I put this, throughout my life I have consistently been left unassisted. What I mean by this is that often when I was learning to do something -even when I was part of a group or class- where more experienced people or teachers would rush to help someone, it was never me. It was something I started to notice more as I got older because it appeared in social situations and made me feel less loved rather than more advanced. When I mentioned it to a friend once we were playing pool and someone stepped in to help her learn to line up her shots. I think I said something like, "Why don't you help me?" And they said, "Well, you don't seem to need help." Which confounded me as I didn't feel I was performing any better than she was. Best I can figure is this came from becoming very independent early on. When you know you're not going to get any help, you don't expect it and therefor don't appear to "need" it. I've noticed it time and again and to be honest I've grown so accustomed to not getting this special attention that when I do get it it makes me feel kind of nervous and my performance suffers. I even noticed it a number of times in the past year with beauty school: there were teachers who never interfered with my work or questioned what I was doing which kind of made me feel that I was getting the attention I maybe should have been and there were teachers who wanted to supervise me and interject with nearly ever step I took in a process which made me feel underestimated and anxious.
So I just came across an article via some site I've already forgotten which wrote their short article based on this one in Time which talks about how much better it is to learn something on your own, especially if you find yourself struggling with it at first. This is fascinating as when I was in those situations where someone else was being given instruction, it was always the same person or people who would be aided in every new situation. I never thought of any of them as dunces but they seemed always to get this attention and I'm thinking now, that ultimately, they were set up to become not-as-good at learning things. I've always appreciated my independence, even though I do think it's caused me to miss out on some things -especially socially. But now I'm actually really glad to have cultivated it so early on as I have always felt that given the opportunity I could learn just about anything and struggling doesn't ever seem to discourage me quite enough to make me give up.

I know I write about my dreams sometimes but I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned my cat dreams. Every so often I have dreams that are full of cats. This has been happening for years and I'm becoming pretty certain that I've got some sort of personal symbolism for them as the dreams have been evolving lately.
For years when I had one of these dreams they would be kind of disturbing and depressing because it seemed that the "theme" wasn't just "lot's of cats in one place" but it would be something more along the lines of "lot's of cats in one place that is kind of a weird place for there to be lot's of cats and many or all of them seem to be unhealthy or sometimes wounded". These weren't good dreams I was having. I've also had dreams with lot's of dogs (although not so much with health issues) and once had a dream of lot's of rats that I was trying to "save" and hold gathered up in my skirt which wasn't working very well and I've had plenty of dreams of lot's of animals -even totally invented animals that don't exist in reality.
But recently I've been having the lot's of cats dreams again but they've been very different. For one thing a lot of them lately have featured strong, healthy baby kittens which is different than the cats I used to dream about. And then last night I had one of these dreams again (including some dogs, I believe) and what was even more obvious about the difference is that A: I no longer felt solely responsible for the animals in my dream (-and overwhelmed and helpless), and B: not only were the animals now strong and healthy and happy but in last nights dream we also had some kind of veterinarian person who was totally on top of taking care of the one animal who needed help.
Without getting into the actual symbolism of it all I've just been taking this all as generally good omens. Things are getting better. And better. And I expect nothing less that for this to continue, onward and upward.

Finally got around to bringing up the hem on this dress and repairing an unraveling seam so that I can wear it this spring and summer. It's one of my favorite and longest owned vintage dresses. 

Great Day

As I've mentioned a few times I just recently finished beauty school and am about to start the next phase of working on my new career as a hairdresser. Many things about this have been a little scary for me. One of the best and worst parts of it, in fact, is that as a hairdresser you basically work for yourself. The scary part of this, for me at least, has been trying to figure out how to build a clientele. Today I got a "sign" and a great compliment rolled into one. A girl who I recently met to arrange for cat sitting for her and her husband sent me a note with instructions for the kitties and a PS at the bottom saying: Who does your hair? It looks gorgeous and I'm looking for a new stylist.

Wow. That is a great compliment on so many levels because, as you all know, I do my own hair. With the recent dramatic color change it was wonderful to hear from a stranger that it looks great because I'm still adjusting to it myself and apparently don't trust anyone I know to not be lying a little when they tell me it looks great -because they love me and want me to feel good, right? And as a just-starting-out stylist it was amazing to hear this because every head of hair you work on is a billboard for your work and so, in a sense, I've just seen that concept work! I'm now beyond ecstatic and my confidence in the potential of my success has leapt about a mile. 

With all this extra time on my hands again I've gotten back to reading. Not that I've ever really stopped reading but there have been times when I didn't have the focus for it or didn't seem to have time for it. It's been a while since I read a whole book in two days (I honestly can't remember ever having read a whole book in two days, actually). Last night was windy and then rainy. I recently threw away my sofa cushions (?) because the dogs has dug through them and they've been uncomfortable and messy for a while and I suddenly realized it was pointless to keep them. Strangely enough I find the couch more comfortable now than ever, with the extra height of the back and the arm it makes a perfect corner for me to cozy into. So last night I read for hours in my sofa corner with the sound of hard rain and wind outside. Lovely.
Today was absolute madness -I won't bother with the details, it's all over now. It seems another storm is blowing in, and I've got fresh books from the library so I'm all set.
Turns out I'm finally enjoying all the extra free time now that I'm done with school. I wasn't expecting to and was hustling to get things lined up to fill my time but so far it's just been a little so I'm going to happily enjoy this last little reprieve before my test and starting a new job.

Honestly

Perhaps it's Mercury stationing direct (now in the "storm" phase) or maybe I've just completely flipped my lid but the strangest and most interesting things have been occurring to me since mid-afternoon. Let me clarify: strange and interesting maybe only to me as they are mostly low key "revelations" about my long standing mood problems (doesn't that sound nice and non-threatening and not very serious?).
First off, I really am thinking that I might have an internet addiction. It's just such an easy toy to turn to when I'm bored, there's so much out there. But it quickly becomes a habit and even though I know that I feel much better if I'm actually doing something -like gardening or going out for a walk or doing hair or making something or even just cleaning the house- there are times when I just can't think of anything else and I plop down in front of my computer.
This leads me to my worst nasty-thoughts-of-the-day which is that I got really annoyed after spending a while perusing a number of blogs of young ladies who are similar to myself and post a lot of photos of things and places they like, write a bit about how they feel and little stories from their lives -all good stuff that I enjoy. But after scrolling through one too many, I guess, I came across a girl who had posted a series of photos of herself taken in a cute outfit in a 7-Eleven parking lot followed by a series of herself wearing a cute outfit on the beach staring out at the ocean and I just got totally nauseated. I can think of a number of "reasons why" I felt this way but they're all petty and lame and don't really make any sense beyond that perhaps I was feeling overly saturated at that point.
When I sat down to write this I had a pretty clear idea of what I was going to rant about but suddenly it's gone fuzzy..... And that's kind of the basis of everything for me lately. I feel like crap, I start to surface and see more clearly, I feel ridiculous for having been so blind (I hate cliches but they're always just so easy to reach), I feel upset for the time I lost feeling bad, I realize again all the REAL reasons that I have felt so bad for so long which actually seem entirely beyond my control (and therefor valid) and then I see a girl who takes twenty photo's of herself sucking down a big gulp in front of a 7-Eleven and think "Where does she get the confidence to not feel ridiculous doing this?!" It's highly likely that this is partially fueled by my having skipped a mid-day meal because I didn't know what I was hungry for. Not to worry, dinner's on the stove.

Addendum: I just remembered one of the things I wanted to say. I'm really tired of squelching what I honestly think and feel. I certainly don't want to hurt any feelings, I truly am a kind person, but I feel like  I'm always seeing two extremes in people: the ones who don't believe in having dreams or the possibility of making them real, and the ones who live in utter fantasy, shunning all practicalities. I'm kind of sick of it all but it's hard to say. More aptly, I suppose, I'm tired of feeling stuck in one or the other of these extremes. There IS a happy medium to be found there and I intend to find it and live in it.

Zooming Into the Future

Dreaming and dreaming and dreaming. It never stops. They're wild and vivid as ever and I even have them when I nap. The other night I had a dream that I was rushing to train stations and boarding and riding trains all night. I finally thought to look up the symbolism of trains and found it's all about evolution and very good -"They are signs of our psychic development and indications that we have become self-aware and are moving towards a new life." Ah!!! What a brilliant sign to dream of. And how interesting to dream this just as I graduate beauty school (Saturday was my final day!), am looking at moving house, and Venus moved into Gemini today (heavily influencing my romantic love life) to stay for the next six months -wheeee!

Last night the first of the two flowers opened. As you can see it was gorgeous, there's very little I can say about it. I noticed it was beginning to open at dusk and later took a photo of it fully open. Surprisingly it stayed open all day today. The first one I had I missed seeing open as one morning I went outside and could see that it had opened and closed during the night. Also, it was white rather than this beautiful pink. I thought it was on the same plant but maybe I'm wrong -I have two types and multiple plants...

Tonight is even more spectacular with both flowers now fully blooming.

I couldn't decide if I liked better the photo with less flash that looks so very nighttime or the one with more flash that shows off the colors better.

These are the budding flowers on my Night Blooming Cereus. They're the second and third ever on this plant (I have a few, all grown from clippings) and I missed seeing the first one open so I'm really excited about these. They only open at night and will actually close up again if you shine a light on them but I'm hoping to sneak up and catch them with my camera flash (it seems a little cruel but I can't help myself). I've been checking them every night and I'm thinking tonight may be the night. 

One of the streets I often walk with my dogs is lined on both sides with tall palms trees. It also happens to be on the crest of a big hill. Strong wind rushing through the palms sounds like huge ocean waves crashing incessantly. It's almost as good as the ocean itself.

The other day I got in a mood and wrote a post about how my neighborhood is losing it's soul. Little pieces of it's history are being erased and replaced. I complained about the gas station changing names (only because the old name is soooo great, Magic Gas!), and the new cafe owners painting over the replacement Chicken Corner chicken mural and redecorating the inside of the cafe -I still don't like the new decor, too cold.
But just after I wrote that I went out and I needed to stop for gas so ofcourse I went to Magic Gas (I will never call it anything else). I was reminded that the new guy that works there is super friendly and nice, which is actually a big improvement on the previous employee. And then while I was standing there waiting for my tank to fill up I looked across the street at the new mural on Chicken Corner and saw that it's still in progress and there's more to it than I initially remember seeing, perhaps because they've been working on it, and it's not so bad after all.
I always reserve the right to change my opinion. There's been a lot of commotion and fog in my life lately and this morning -after I cleared up a few more things with some phone calls- I realized that things are not looking so bad after all but when one or two things start looking sketchy it's easy to be disappointed in many, many more things.
I think I'll be spending this week looking more on the bright side again. It's kind of crazy when so many things are changing and so many things I feel should be changing are not, but overall it's worth the effort.

Lately I've been sleeping so hard that I feel kind of drunk when I wake up in the morning. As usual, this is accompanied by heavy dreaming and they're all weird. The other night my dream was full of animals that don't exist in real life -and some that do, I fought a wild boar that had wandered into my house.
Last night I climbed a steep wobbly "staircase" that was made of narrow boxes stacked up against the outside of a building which was halfway up a tall, steep hill I needed to get to the top of to get home. All of my "friends" had abandoned me for some juvenile reason (or rather, all of my friends had shown clear signs of betrayal if I were to stick with them so I took off on my own) and I seemed to remember the same route from a previous dream but this time it was different. The makeshift staircase was much wobblier and all the pieces of it were unattached and flimsy. I was terrified to climb it but knew I had no choice. When I finally got to the top it seemed the building had a new tenant and rather than the kind old man I remembered from the last time -who would have helped me through the window so that I could walk through his shop to continue up the hill- there was a shady guy who let me cling to the building begging for help while he stole my credit card before allowing an employee to help me through the window. Strangely I knew that ultimately I would be ok and that this was just an annoyance along my way. Sadly this is illustrative of recent developments in my real life. I seem to be dealing with some unsavory characters lately and while I know that I'm ultimately pretty "safe", I'm really ready to get these people out of my life.

Honey

So happy! This is my new hair and strangely enough it's pretty much my natural color -which hasn't been seen on my head since I was about 15. It looks a little darker in the photo than it does in real life (same is true of the red, which is why it looks cute to me in the photo below but I couldn't deal with it in real life). It's a color I've wanted to try for a while (not realizing it was my natural color), kind of a darkish honey. 

Little thing I was reminded of this week: it's important to have at least one really good friend in the world who will tell you the truth even if it's not "nice". Being "nice" is reeeeally overrated. Telling someone the truth in a way that isn't mean, that is an amazing quality that very few people possess. 

To The Next Phase!

Well I spent a week as a strawberry blonde but I'm really sad to say it just wasn't for me. The first problem is that I could never be quite sure what it looked like. When you're looking at someone else's hair it's easier to be more objective. You can look at it up close, you can look at it from a distance, and you have no personal attachment to how it feels to see it. There's something quite strange about going from looking in the mirror and recognizing yourself to looking in the mirror and not being quite sure who you're looking at. It took me all week to decide that it just wasn't the right shade for me. The photo's make it look much, much better than it seems to look in real life -big problem. So I'm taking it a few shades darker and going for an amber brown, or technically, an amber dark blonde. I've left out the ends of the underneath section since they're not around my face and therefor don't contrast with my complexion, and also because there is still something magnificent about seeing my previously super dark brown hair in shades of blonde. Just not when it's around my face. Pictures to follow.

Strawberry Blonde!

Yesterday I dyed my hair strawberry blonde (with some violet roots...). I was going for something more like a weave of peachy strawberry blonde and some muted blue red (but got tired of the whole process and haven't gotten around to adding the blue red yet). It looks good and I felt "adorable" for about thirty minutes last night after I'd finished it and dried it. I still like it this morning but just had a moment of: well this is boring, I want my dark hair back. Which has been my response nearly every time I've tried something other than brunette for the last oooooh ten years? I think it's just so comfortable..... to not make changes. I decided not to think about it and went online to to see what the news is today and came across the latest from Style Like U, an interview with Tavi Gevinson (who I love). As I was watching the video I noticed that a) she has about the same hair color right now that I just gave myself, and b) sometimes teenagers know stuff that adults have already forgotten. She was talking a lot about having unusual style and the courage to wear it and be openly yourself, basically. What I realized is that I'm not one to wear something in order to get attention. I wear what I like, it makes me feel happy. If other people like it, then yes, ofcourse that makes me feel even better. But as a kind of low key person I don't really like getting tooooo much attention, it's a fine balance. So yes, it's kind of hard for me to go from dark dark brown hair to strawberry blonde. I don't quite feel like myself yet. I'm sure that when I go outside today I will not be mobbed by strangers in the street because my hair is a new color, this is my irrational fear. Weird, yes?

PS: I tried to take a photo for this post but I always feel like a fool smiling for my computer and the alternative is the blank serious face.

I'm loving my new half red hair so much that I'm actually considering going all red! The only discouraging thing about it is the damage from bleaching so before I go any further I definitely need to find an exceptional conditioning treatment. I'm wearing this sweater right now which is a fine melange of orange pink and blue pink which I'd love to match my hair to, at least in tone. As you can see it's not even near the lightness at this point.

This morning I woke up to pouring rain, my absolute favorite weather partly because it never lasts long enough to get tired of (a couple years when it poured for weeks on end, months even, I thought I might get tired of it but never did). So I'll definitely have to get out in it after breakfast.

Alright so I DID it! My new hair looks like I have a brunette wig over red hair. My only complaint is the spot at the part that came out very orange gold but whatever, I can fix that. I also think I'll be adding some more red into the underneath/bottom. But mostly I'm quite pleased with myself. Here's a rare photo of me even though I think it's not very good as I didn't get much sleep last night and am kinda puffy today. (Also the exposure is out of whack but I can't do anything about the sun shining through my window :)

Also (obviously) my hair came out a more "natural" copper red even though I was really hoping for a muted red red that would look kind of like the pink used below. That I will have to work on for sure but all things considered I really like the color I got. 

Oh  my god, I think I'm finally getting a little bit sick! This is both hideous as I want to believe that I'm so adaptable that I just surrender to change without issue and at the same time I kind of excited because it means the change is so big that I'm having a hard time handling it. It's that or I'm having a totally understandable allergy attack considering the weather and the fact that I haven't gotten acupuncture in over a month.... It's all the same, right?

In reality there are many sides to everything. As with any sort of variety, you probably won't be able to relate to every single choice. There will again be a variety of attitudes and feelings toward each facet. And that's life. I think this is part of what finally bloomed with Neptune now in Pisces. I'm going to stop referring to it as "Neptune out of Aquarius", as I have been, and start referring to it in the present: Neptune in Pisces.

The Mayoruna tribe of the Peruvian and Brazilian Amazon believe they are jaguars inhabiting the bodies of humans. They tattoo their faces to look like wild cats and wear whiskers. They're said to be telepathic.

2012 Time for Change Theatrical Trailer Large

I just watched this amazing documentary which I can't even begin to describe. It covers everything from mythology to mind expansion to discussions of the current economic system to sustainable design. It's absolutely brilliant and I hope that everyone will watch it, I found it on Netflix and watched it on my computer.

One of the best little bits that tied it all together was when the journalist who made this film, Daniel Pinchbeck, is interviewing someone (there are sooo many people, I can't remember, I believe he was a scientist who studies psychic phenomena) says something to the effect of: if enough people believe in something catastrophic happening in 2012 it doesn't mean that this catastrophe is inevitable, but people believing in this and fearing it can create something catastrophic. In which case, why don't we show them that there can be an alternative transformative experience.

This is what I have been hearing from many sources and believing in myself and I am still and even more ready for that transformation.