Uranus in Aries

Saturday  April 9, 2011

As Uranus completes its first of 98 new moons in the sign Aries we look back on the last time it was in this aggressive sign.  But first, when I say 98 new moons I do not mean that every one of them will be in Aries.  It is a high energy coincidence that Uranus entered the territory of Aries just nine days before spring equinox.  To get things charged up even more, when the moon met the sun, on April 3^rd, we also had mercury, Jupiter and mars in Aries.  As I begin writing this post, on April 9, the moon has waxed from the thin crescent it was in Aries to its first quarter and moved onto the sign Cancer; but we of course still have mercury, Jupiter, the sun and mars to keep Uranus company as it begins its 7 year Arian passage of rapidly increasing light. 

When the sun moves in to Taurus at the end of the month things should calm down a wee bit.  The problem is that by then venus will have entered Aries!  As our queen of balance and tranquility, she has a big challenge ahead.

Monday  April 11, 2011

Here we are two days later with the moon well advanced in the sign Cancer, and boy do I feel tender.  I’ve been in bed for the last two days with a cold rag over my head.  Last night I made my son cook dinner, and today the dishes and laundry are piled high. 

Uranus in Aries:  originality, excitement and inevitably there will be violence.  Nothing gets us going like a disturbing disaster or even a close call.  Adrenalin.  All Aries.  Aries is birth, the coming into existence of something that a moment ago was no more than a dreamy idea; the wet baby that was a dry black and white shadow on a computer screen.

What happens when the light is small, slow and distant, coming from a gas giant rolling around the outskirts of the hood, low rider anthems blasting from the speakers?  It can feel pretty threatening and in fact is.  It clearly was in April 1927, the last time Uranus started its term as an in-your-face iconoclast.  Honest.  What you see is what you get.  Like a duck running across pavement, you just can’t ignore those webbed feet slapping away on the hard, flat surface.

Here we are 84 years later, the ‘other’ ringed planet once again rolling on its giant bass-thumping wheels into the rough neighborhood. “Thank goodness,” say those of us with a low tolerance for adversity, “there at least is a civil sheriff in town.”  Back in 1927 this passage was accompanied by a lot less stirring up of the dust; the chorus was more of a march and a lot more organized.

Another thing that was a lot more peaceful about the Uranian spring of 1927 was that the martial element started out weaker than the rulers; the sun met mars in Libra in October of 1927.  The martial element at that point was diplomatic and shortly after, when they did gain power, exercised it more passively through shrewd politics.  So the beginning of this passage in 1927 was a lot less dramatic and chaotic than what we are experiencing now.

Another interesting and statistically significant difference between the current and the former Uranian crossing into Aries is the position of Neptune: in 1927 Neptune was in the last year of a 10 year old party in Leo; this month it enters its home territory of Piscean romanticism after a long, sobering passage through the Aquarian highlands.

It is hard to find another point in recent history when so many people have been so pumped up and eager to believe in fantasies.

Thank goodness indeed for the civil sheriff.  In October of next year (2012) that authority figure will cross over to Scorpio entering an arena where they are forced to deal from their gut instead of their head.  They will be organizing power plays and manipulating from behind the scenes.  The winds will die down, and many of the fires in the streets will have long since been extinguished.  Our attention will again be focused on the minutia of daily existence, rather than the eruptions of righteous citizens.