This ‘n That: November Astrology Notes

My friend David Roell runs a real brick and mortar bookshop in Maryland. It is one of the best annexes around for all things astrological. He just notified me that his bookstore’s shipment of Jim Maynard‘s Celestial Guide calendars have arrived and that it’s time for you to order yours now.

Please consider purchasing your calendar from an astrologer and an astrology bookshop as it goes a long way in keeping a business like David’s Astrology Center of America available to all of us. David has an incredibly comprehensive collection of books and we want to keep him and his business around for a long time.

About the calendars, David offered this fascinating observation:

“Give one to a child who wants to learn the craft. Have him/her learn to use the voids as a guide to daily activities. Train him to sense the Moon’s transit through the various signs, give him practical advice from Mercury retrograde, etc.

From what I’ve worked out, astrology shows the Earth’s daily temperature, in other words the Earth’s unique ever-changing vibration as it continuously relates to the Sun, Moon and other planets. Astrology does not rain from an empty sky. It radiates from the earth itself . You should no more ignore the daily ephemeris than you should go out of doors without regard to the weather. Astrology describes the raw energies of this planet, our home, nothing more and nothing less. That’s what Maynard has given us, on a daily basis and set in our own proper time for easy reference.”

Astro Web Destinations

Two of my favorite astrology websites that I want to note for you this month are both published by women and they both offer unique insights into the ongoing dialogue between you and me and the solar system. I prefer sites like this where you develop a distinct sense of the author’s character and proclivities; a kind of approachability that tempers astrology’s intimidating complexities. This brings astrology down to earth and makes it accessible without involving Sun sign banter or romance advice (not that I’ve anything against that sort of astrology).

A good example of what I’m talking about is Wonder Bright‘s Stars of Wonder.

Wonder’s prose is akin to sitting down with a friend over a cup of coffee and moving through a myriad of topics both celestial and terrestrial. Her first-person retellings generate an inviting aperture on the astrological matrix.

I particularly enjoyed her recent rumination on the Twilight series of movies, the story’s heroine Bella, and how our culture has become so distanced from a healthy connection to the feminine we’ve had to devise a way back to her essence through the supernatural realm. Highly recommended.

My friend and art colleague Kate Petty publishes Ambient Astrology, a beautiful respite and reminder that astrology websites don’t have to resemble a carnival attraction to hold your attention.

Kate’s fierce interest in some of astrology’s more esoteric and complex modalities, namely the school of Symmetrical Astrology (the bug of which bit me hard when I met up with one of its kingpins, Gary Christen, at the recent NORWAC astrology convention in Seattle) and employing antiscia when studying the various markers of the horoscope, underlie many of her articles.

Kate’s most recent post, Reclaiming the Apocalypse, will give you pause when you consider the intense, unprecedented array of exact planetary aspects we’ll experience through the remainder of November. Spend time with this piece and you’ll come away with a new way of considering what living through a cycle’s final throes implies. It’s both thrilling and unnerving, but we wouldn’t be here to usher in this new phase if we weren’t gifted with the substance of soul to persevere.

Have a site you think I should know about? Please share your comments below. I’m all ears (and eyes).