PLANET WAVES by ERIC FRANCIS
For March 26, 1999. This is the April monthly. There is also a Spring special edition posted on the Planet Waves home page.

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Spring 1999 Horoscopes | Main Menu | Horoscopes Menu | Fun Sex Article

Send your Early Morning Confessions to: eric@PlanetWaves.net

ARIES (March 21-April 19)
The first days of the Sun's trip through Aries are colored with all kinds of great symbolism. Of course, the Vernal Equinox, when day and night are the same length -- which was March 21 -- is the first day of Spring in the northern hemisphere. But then there is the more esoteric level. A new astrological year begins as the Sun appears to cross the first degree of the zodiac, which is symbolized by the image of a woman emerging from the sea, and a seal waiting on the beach to embrace her. That day, March 21, is called "The Day of Clarty," according to the fabulous book The Secret Language of Birthdays. Yet the astrology of the current year speaks of a period of careful reflection for Aries souls, of understanding the past and making contact with the nature of your deepest desires. Let it be the reflection of a new light.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20)
One of the world's most prominent Taurans is a journalist and political prisoner on Pennsylvania's death row named Mumia Abu-Jamal (born April 24). For some people, Jamal is seen as a "controversial" figure because he was convicted of killing a cop (in a ridiculous sham trial), but to me, he embodies a karmic struggle of the first magnitude for our culture: are blacks and whites treated equally? Is our justice system remotely fair? Is it sane to murder people as punishment for alleged (or proven) murder? In my mind, it makes sense that a Taurus would be the one to take this struggle on his shoulders, but I'm not sure why. Novelist Alice Walker called Jamal, "A rare and courageous voice speaking from a place we fear to know." Till your fast-approaching birthday, I suggest you consider to what extent the same is true for you.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20)
So, rather than tell you all about the status of the currently unfolding Mercury Retrograde 1999 Version 1, I decided I would ask. Never before have an audience and a columnist been able to communicate so instantaneously: and I actually read my own email. So far, my entire life is running late, I've gotten reports of a few mail servers down (as in call in the union plumbers), I've heard one bizarre report of a person entering an email address into a web browser and coming up with the right page (impossible), and one astrologer named Kalli in San Francisco doing reverse cartwheels to celebrate these glorious and soon-ending weeks of mental madness. I ask you to please contribute to the annals of astrological history, and send me a rundown of significant life events since March 9. Anything goes. Eric@PlanetWaves.net, or mail to: Planet Waves, PO Box 208, Woodstock, NY 12498.

CANCER (June 21-July 22)
More from the Career Advice In My Opinion department. In case you're interested in switching jobs right around now, my official astrological position is that you not attempt to fart around with anything that doesn't really get your engines hot. Some rather bright stars are now shining on you. This is not the year to take "something temporary till you're ready to do what you really want." This is the year to rock and roll. With human incarnations currently lasting about 80 years with excellent luck, why piss away life on mediocrity, and here in the wildest-ever moment in history, there is enormous, indeed, stunning potential for adventure. This is the time to do exactly what you want to do, and the stars have not been better since one rare, glowing afternoon back when Jimmy Carter was president.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22)
It's difficult for me to believe that this is anything but one of the very best times of your life. These days and months, this year and into the next, are about far more than breaking free of the bonds that have held you back and down, though the satanic jail cell commonly known as "the past" is particularly fragile now. This extended stage of your life is about finally living your freedom, expanding into greater realities and, in a phrase, living in a larger world. Please consider the words of Wilhelm Reich written about Sigmund Freud, the father of modern psychology, for they represent the very line upon which you now tread: "Learning and knowledge came to mean more to him than human happiness, especially in view of the fact that people themselves appeared not to make the best of happiness when it came their way."

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sep. 22)
I know of a Virgo who has some interesting Internet hobbies, one of which is a web page featuring pictures from around the world of those yellow signs that say "Caution-Wet Floor." You could make a lot of funny Virgo jokes about that, everything from the strange creative obsessions to hanging out in recently-cleaned places, but the symbolic connections to your current solar chart were rather striking. With Mercury, one of your home planets, currently sliding retrograde in the slippery, watery sign Pisces, the whole picture fits rather perfectly. Both literally and figuratively, be careful where you put your feet. The floor is wet. And be prepared for some fast changes between now and April 2.

LIBRA (Sep. 23-Oct. 22)
The funny thing about Blue Moons is, they've been showing up quite often lately. I have not been keeping count, but this reportedly rare condition -- of two Full Moons occurring within one calendar month -- seems to be breeding like a rabbit. There's yet another Blue Moon coming March 31. In Libra, by the way. (And in the Western US, the timing is perfect to watch the astronomically exact opposition between the Sun and the Moon cross the horizon that evening. find a high place with views of both horizons.) All I can say is, the Blue Moon chart is juicy, and it rings like bells, and its skin is as soft as ... well, a Libra's bottom. I am going to take a week off from suggesting any glorious possibilities for you; I might fall far short of what's coming.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 22)
Most people have no time for astrology. But I have it on good advice that more Scorpios read their horoscopes than any other sign. And it just happens that Scorpio has taken center stage in the astrological world, as Mars slows to a halt in the night sky and prepares to enter one of its rare retrograde periods, deep in the heart of mystical Scorpio, where it will grace the night sky for all to see during the next few months. The word, cousin, is desire. Though cursed and scorned by evangelists, dodged or resisted by Buddhists, avoided by those cowering from life and its challenges, feared by those too weak to make a decision, check it out: Desire is just about all you can trust right now. Speak it out loud. Eat it like food, and drink it like water. Stand in it like a pair of good boots. Or ballet slippers.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 23-Dec. 21)
There's an esoteric tool called Karma Cards by Monte Farber. The cards are arranged in three little decks of 12 cards each, one deck for planets, one for signs and one for houses. You draw one card from each pack, and have an instant astrological reading. They teach you astrology, they're spot-on as a fortune telling device, and they're not even expensive. With Pluto in Sagittarius in your Second Solar House so magnificently illuminated this week, I couldn't even find the worlds to express my glee, so here's Monte's take on those stars: "Resurrect (Pluto) your highest ideals (Sagittarius) patiently (Second House). Get to the heart of (Pluto) the rules of (Sagittarius) what you want (Second House). Do or die! (Pluto) You must get it out to the world (Sagittarius) and get what you need (Second House)." So be it.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)
Last summer, during the first contact of the current Saturn-Neptune square, I had a little paroxysm of glee about the existence of the Brooklyn Bridge, which I considered to be the perfect metaphor for an astonishing mixture of stone and vision. And though I grew up in Brooklyn, I'd never walked across it, and finally had a chance to last fall. Suddenly, standing on the walkway high above the Earth and the traffic and eye-to-eye with skyscrapers, I was flooded with memories of so many forgotten dreams of walking over that bridge, yet I was stunned at how much larger it really was than I had ever envisioned. Let's take this literally for a moment. Walk into your dreams, and discover that they are stronger, wider and more towering than you believed they really were, or could be.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 19-Feb. 18)
I had an idea for a column called, "On this day in 999," which would be a daily report of what happened 1000 years ago. But when I checked history, it seemed that nothing much leaps out from the year 999 except the last expedition of the Emperor Basil the Second, emperor of what I am not sure. Is it possible that in the year 3000, future horoscope readers will look back on us as mere fleas on the butt of history? Will the prophets of the next millennium profess to unearth the lost wisdom of the current Golden Era, which unbeknownst to them was squandered cigarettes and The Gap? In this current week of the Blue Moon, I propose you come up with two or three ways to make some history. God knows, we need it.

PISCES (Feb. 19-Mar. 20)
Your ideas and perceptions about what is past, what is present and what is future may be a bit mixed up these days, as retrograde Mercury swims upstream in your own sign for the next week, then stops, then swims back downstream. It reminds me of the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, when a forgetfulness spell came over the whole town, and the local fortune teller spent her days doing Tarot card readings explaining peoples' pasts to them. But I suggest you not get too lost in this surrealist soup. Experience shows that time moves in many directions. If you reflect on your life, you may notice that what you're living today was long ago foretold, which simply means that you are living in the future. It's a pretty wild place, but to appreciate this to the fullest, you will need to stay firmly grounded in the present.

FOR THE FAITHFUL
To frig or not to frig, that is the question, especially on a Friday. Though the word is often used as a euphemism for "fuck," "frig" seems to be of 19th century origin, meaning (either) finger-fucking a female, or female masturbation. Frig may come from the Old French friquer, to rub, and Merriam-Webster gives Middle English fryggen -- to wriggle -- as the origin. All lovely enough indeed. However, I was reading the Stargazer (astronomy) column in the Colorado Daily last week, and the writer informed me of what I probably should have known, which is that Friday is named after the Anglo-Saxon goddess Frigg, who would be the equivalent of the Venus, a/k/a Aphrodite. Coincidence? Synchronicity? Or is Friday really the best day of the week? =PW=
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Eric Francis is a professional astrologer. For information about private readings, see http://www.PlanetWaves.net/personal.html, or contact Eric's office at eric@PlanetWaves.net.