Weekly Weather

Weekly Weather July 28, 2008

The eclipses are coming! The eclipses are coming! All week long, we energetically build up to the New Moon Total Eclipse of the Sun at 9 Leo on Friday! The path of the eclipse rolls over the Arctic Circle, across Northern Russia and ends at the Great Wall of China, just in time for the Olympics. Eclipses are super powerful new or full moons, loaded with juicy, popping energy. During an eclipse the Sun, Earth and Moon all line up, in a cosmic row. Because they are in a row in the sky, they cast shadows on each other as they dance about in the heavens. The ancients (and the astrologers) knew eclipses marked and proclaimed either falls from power/ grace or sudden rises to prominence, leaving behind the old roles. Obviously, kings, emperors and leaders watched for eclipses very carefully. There was caution, hand wringing and waiting to see what was going to take place. In fact, two twin Chinese astrologers were beheaded for not forecasting an eclipse over the land. And, the emperor who killed them lost his power.

We regular mortals don’t lose our thrones although we might lose or gain power some place in our lives. Eclipses do bring to light situations that were previously hidden. They bring a sense of urgency and a feeling it needs to be dealt with NOW! There is an escalated and enhanced sense of urgency under an eclipse where you are driven by the feeling that you have to do something right this minute! You actually DON’T have to do any thing. The situation will take care of itself. But you FEEL like you absolutely, totally, completely MUST do something! Often, the situation has been like that for a while, festering, brewing, percolating. NOW you simply can‘t stand it a minute more!

Things that are waiting to “pop” actually do “pop” or break or give out. The analogy of popping a pimple or lancing a boil is good imagery to apply to the energy of an eclipse. Folks or situations that have been lingering, undecided or unclear which way to go, suddenly sit right up and make a decision and go. Again, the situation could have been building up for a while. NOW, right now, it needs to move to the next level ~ either up or down, over and out, yes or not, adios or hello. All the energy around transition and change is for healing’s sake and, for lack of a better word, your soul’s evolution.

So, because we are in Eclipse Time, we are entering a fairly volatile emotional period which will run until September 8 or so. The eclipse period technically runs 2 weeks before the first eclipse lunation to two weeks after the last eclipse. So the Eclipse Time wraps on August 30. Good or bad we leave the Eclipse Time and head into the next week which features a week long build up to the Jupiter /Pluto stations to go direct on September 8. So think of this as an extended eclipse. The Jupiter/ Pluto stations at the end add an extra poignancy, emotionality and clarity to the Eclipse Time. Whatever happens during the Eclipse Time will have a sharper finality and finishing energy to it as well.

Think of it as the end of a major chapter of your life. It is. It is also the BEGINNING of a MAJOR NEW CHAPTER of YOUR LIFE. The purpose of these next few weeks are to release stuff that needs to leave and to wrap up things that are done, finished and kaput. The purpose is so you can start your NEXT chapter with a fresh slate. For what it is worth, it can also be a time to wrap up the stuff begun in 1984, 1995 and even 1972 or 1959 if you want to go time traveling backwards through your life. A whole new evolutionary cycle is beginning for all of us here on Planet Earth. That is why the old cycles are resonating and ringing across our Planet Earth and in our being. That is what that giant rumbling feeling is just below the surface, moving in your belly, low, deep and strong. That is what makes it feel so much bigger on the insides of you than it appears on the outsides of you. That is why folks feel like they are all living a bit more isolated in their own lives. We are evolving. Moving from Caterpillars into Butterflies. The evolutionary impulse is growing inside each of us. Evolve. Evolve. Evolve.

There can be fabulous new beginnings on this eclipse as it marks an exciting cycle starting. According to Bernadette Brady in her book, The Eagle and The Lark, “This eclipse is known for breaking out of a negative situation where no hope can be seen to a more positive space containing many options. A worry that may have been affecting a person will suddenly clear. The solution is shown by the Cosmos and needs to be take up without too much delay.” We are able to release problems that previously seemed unsolvable! Good news!! So focus on the release energy and focus on your vision of where you want to go next. Don’t worry. No fear. Focus on Love. Talk to your worried inner being with love.

The week ahead also features Venus going through some tough aspects. No more emotional feelings, understanding or processing like Mercury did last week before he moved into Leo. Venus is large and in charge in Fire Leo. She’s going to speak to your soul about your profound and deepest desires, finances, dreams and what you value. Venus is about passion. Passion with a capital P! You will be asked to stand up for what you are passionate about. You will have to announce what your desires are. Be brave. Be bold. Go for it. Your heart is at stake.

Mercury is moving quickly and will catch up with Venus next week. Venus is going to aspect all the planets in the Finger of God from June. While most of them have separated and aren’t in the form of the Finger, Venus is going to be chatting them up now that they have had a month or so to process things. Venus dove into the South Node releasing some thing / ending some thing OR pulling in a major new love or desired object last week. This week, she refines what she learned and experienced last week. So if it FELT like a LOSS, it wasn‘t ~ it was a release. If it FELT like a new connection, move towards it bravely and with love in your heart. It can be a bit of both actually as Venus is SO active, our emotions are active too!

Finally, Mars is setting off the eclipse from last September and bringing up the story from back then. The 18^th degree of Virgo is the degree of the Sun on 9-11 as well as the degree for Saturn and his opposition to Uranus on the upcoming election on November 4, 2008. It is also the degree of Neptune in the USA chart. That 18 Virgo degree corresponds to Presidential deaths and assassinations according to Frances McEvoy.

Monday, Moon in Gemini ruled by Mercury in Leo offers a bit of jolliness and creativity amidst the emotions. Venus is opposite Chiron offering painful words if you are not careful. People are very sensitive today so be careful what you say as you can offend other’s easily. It’s a walk on egg shells kind of energy. That said, a brilliant idea that is incredibly transformative should be acted on immediately.

Tuesday, Sun and Mercury join in the sky. A combust Mercury is a single minded energy ~ especially around pride, children, creativity and the vision of what they want to do. People are going to be very fixed and fixated on their individual ideas today. You are better off letting them have their vision of what they want to do. They can’t hear you. For what it is worth, you can’t hear so well today either. It is a fabulous day for terrific misunderstandings as we will all hear what we want to hear and ignore the rest. It can be a bit depressive as Mercury joins with Saturn to make the news somber or serious ~ so NO they didn‘t say they wanted to break up with you, they only said what they needed to do. You HEARD they wanted to break up with you. No they aren’t pulling the deal, you HEARD them incorrectly. They are opening the bidding up to other vendors. Keep pitching. Keep moving forward. Keep pushing for what your vision is. Focus on what you’d like. Be aware you can’t hear what they are saying clearly. Run what they said by some one else who might be a bit more clear than you are (or not ~ it is that kind of day). Don’t act on it. Remember we are in eclipse times. If someone loses it emotionally with you today, keep your counsel. Don’t react. It isn’t about you. It is their story. Only today, we all think it is OUR story.

Wednesday Venus has an adjusting aspect with Uranus, triggering the Finger of God energy from June. If you can, circle back to the situation from Monday and Tuesday and double check that you heard what you thought you heard. Sun is in a bit of a blind spot to Saturn today. Double check all things. Think of the day as pulling the car out to pass the slow person ahead of you. Make sure to double check that there is no one in your blind spot. It is a blind spot kind of day. That is also why you are circling back to see if what they said was actually what they meant. Or run it by someone else to see if it makes sense if you can’t ask them yourself. The imagery I get is of the pharmacist in It’s a Wonderful Life after he heard his son had been killed in the war. Jimmy Stewart double checked that order he prepared and saved a life. Double check. Triple check. Quadruple check.

Thursday Venus opposes Neptune as Mars has an adjusting aspect to the North Node. Again we have adjusting energy but this time a bit more cloudy and not so clear. There is a fine opportunity to go off half cocked today. The Finger of God energy from June is again triggered. Remember the purpose for that Finger was to point out to you that you had choices, you made choices, you chose the actions that got you to where you are right now. Your choices created the situations and describe how you live your life now. It IS YOUR LIFE after all. You, on some level, chose it. You might not have been conscious when you chose the situation you find yourself in. But now that you are in it, you do have choices. You can continue to complain about your life all you want. Complaining does NADA. NADA! (Well, actually, it is starting to annoy your friends) Instead change. Instead of complaining, the time has come to change. If you change it, you don‘t have to complain about it any more. If you don‘t want to change it, you need to be quiet and learn to work productively with it. Enough. It is time. At some point we each realize we can’t blame any one else for the situations we find ourselves in. We are the person in charge of our live. We are responsible for our life.

Friday the Solar Eclipse takes place. Read the column on this site for more information on how to work with the eclipse energy. To repeat According to Bernadette Brady in her book, The Eagle and The Lark, “This eclipse is known for breaking out of a negative situation where no hope can be seen to a more positive space containing many options. A worry that may have been affecting a person will suddenly clear. The solution is shown by the Cosmos and needs to be take up without too much delay.” We are able to release problems that previously seemed unsolvable! Good news!! So focus on the release energy and focus on your vision of where you want to go next. Don’t worry. No fear. Focus on Love. Talk to your worried inner being with love. Pluto is pushing on Pallas ~ the patterns that created the situations in your life now are all adjusting, changing, evolving. Mars is arguing with Chiron so emotions are high and words can be fighting or wounding. Try to focus on the higher purpose for the situation. It exists in your life for a reason. It existed in your life to serve you some how. Mercury has harsh words with the whole change and evolve business. Never fear. The only thing that is sure in this world is change is constant. We watch the Sun rise and set, moving the seasons forward. We watch the tides ebb and flow. We watch trees grow. We see our children sprout. So what about you? What do you want to change and grow? Where? How? Why? What is the dream for the next chapter of your life? What is your deepest and most fervent wish? Take time on this New Moon and eclipse to send that wish out into the heavens. You exist on earth for a reason. Your soul incarnated to do something. The time is now. NOW!

Saturn’s day Mercury is a busy bee ~ perhaps it seems overwhelming or too much to process. That is okay. Focus on the part you can wrap your arms around. Wrap your mind around what it can wrap around. MARS IS ARGUING WITH URANUS today by earth aspect so expect volatility every where as well as sudden and unexpected actions, reactions and changes! Remember, the REST of the world is roaming around having absolutely no idea that there is an eclipse, a Pluto sign change and a desire to act NOW. Pickpockets stage a distraction to steal things. In chaos, one can steal. In chaos, one can advance if one knows to use it. Use the energy today to push your agenda forward even if you aren’t 100% sure where you are actually going. Push. Focus on the love and push towards what you want. The energy flying around is highly responsive to the least little touch or direction. So launch things into the world ~ particularly things you want to let go of or release.

Sunday, Mercury has a brilliant idea. Uranus helps him create it. Take the 20,000 foot view. Think satellite picture. What is the big picture? Focus on the overview. Sun joins with the North Node by declination ~ another release. Release. Release. Release. It can also be a realization. Realize. Realize. Realize. Sun has a fifth harmonic aspect with Pallas ~ what is your strategy for the next step. Bitty steps at a time. Forward you go.

Mundane: Both eclipses are quite active in Barack Obama’s chart. The New Moon eclipse is square to Barack Obama’s Neptune in Scorpio and aspecting his Saturn/ Uranus midpoint. The full moon eclipse later in the month on August 16^th is opposite his Uranus, the co-ruler of his Aquarius Ascendant and on his Mars/ Saturn, the other co-ruler of his Ascendant, Sun/ Pluto and Saturn/ Athena midpoints. Midpoints blend the energy of the two planets involved. Please continue to pray for Obama’s physical safety.

Transiting Mars is activating the relocated Ascendant of Dick Cheney at 18 Virgo as the Solar eclipse activates his Sun at 10 Aquarius and Saturn at 8 Taurus ~ and his Sun/ Saturn midpoint. Transiting Mars forms a Finger of God with his Progressed Sun at 18 Aries and the North Node in Aquarius as Uranus forms a number of aspects to solar arc, progressed and natal placements. Expect very interesting news around Mr. Cheney.

The eclipse is activating George Bush’s Ascendant as well as his Mercury /Pluto joined on his Ascendant ~ all 9 Leo. Siblings, communication and power. Again, unexpected news but significant to his life direction and where he is going. At times like these I wish I was a fly on the wall in the White House.

Copyright © 2008 Anne Ortelee All Rights Reserved.

Posted by Anne Ortelee at 03:49 AM | Permalink

Weekly Weather July 21, 2008

The eclipses are coming! The eclipses are coming! We start to build up and feel their energy over the next two weeks. The Solar New Moon eclipse on August 1-2, 2008 takes place on the South Node of Leo. South Nodes are the points of release for the Universe in our charts and our world. According to Bernadette Brady in her book, The Eagle and The Lark, “This eclipse series is known for breaking out of a negative situation where no hope can be seen to a more positive space containing many options. A worry that may have been affecting a person will suddenly clear. The solution is shown by the Cosmos and needs to be take up without too much delay. releasing problems that previously seemed unsolvable”

So THAT is what is coming towards us, a solution to our negative situation. The solution will be here (or start to show itself as a solution) in about two weeks. Then we‘ll get to work with it during the balance of August as the lunar eclipse rolls in behind the solar eclipse. We are paying attention students of the heavens, so we know the TWO weeks BEFORE the eclipse takes place are when the energy starts to build. So, deductive logic applied here, that means the situations are probably going to get a bit worse before they starts to get better ~ especially if we are about to break out of a negative situation on this eclipse.

When I looked at the aspects for the week ahead, I noticed our friend, dear Mercury is taking a pounding, emotionally from just about every one he is talking to or having interactions with. Mercury is in Cancer right now, cardinal water. Words have trouble forming when emotions are high. Water doesn’t carry sound well ~ so distortions in what we hear and say will take place. Water absorbs emotions, feelings, energies so we are going to be picking up everyone ELSE’s emotions, feelings and energies, in addition to our own rolling around in us. Water is the universal solvent so it absorbs and tries to carry or work with the other energies, air, earth and fire. Water dissolves into tears. Water breaks or releases pails of stuff that makes us all wet and soggy. Water is skittish and flows, unsettled when disturbed by a rock, you leaping into the pool or even some thing as subtle as the movement of wind across its surface. Water is SO very sensitive, thin skinned and quite reactive. Water flows! That is why it is so reactive!

So that means the entire world, as well as the Mercury ruled Gemini and Virgo houses and planets in every chart are going to be rocking and rolling with outsized emotions coming from the Cancer parts of our charts ~ family, feelings and those things that are so deep and unnamed that we don‘t have words for them. Cancer rules the pre-verbal stuff that makes us want to curl up in a ball, assume a fetal position, to wail and cry, looking for some nurture for our soul. Honestly, it is all for the good. We are each going to be clearing out very, very, very old stuff that happened to us when we were bitty, small people and caused us to make the choices we’ve made. We don’t have to make those choices any more but realizing that is NOT just an intellectual exercise. To produce real change, we have to feel it emotionally. We have to, as they say in AA, bottom out. Cancer is the 4^th house of the natural wheel. It is the bottom of the chart and thus it holds things that are very hard to get a handle on or put into words.

When I read for folks with a lot of water in their chart, I use the analogy of them being a sponge absorbing stuff around them from everything in their environment, including the people. I suggest the water folks regularly wring them selves out so they don’t get stinky, smelly and moldy. This week, we are all water folks. We will all need to wring ourselves out or we will find ourselves feeling stinky, smelly and moldy. Probably we will need several wringing out times. Lots of emotional fluidity. Wring out your spongy, absorbing emotions self. Good ways to wring your spongy self out are: a good soul searing, streaky faced cry, a cold bath, a hot bath, music, massage, dance, spending time by water, yoga, meditation, time alone, lots of healthful fluids and other things that remind you of water or fluidity. Drugs, alcohol or other self medication stuff will be very, very tempting. Basically, seek out things that remind you of water and act like water for those watery things to absorb all the extra watery feelings in you. Like attracts like. Wring, wring, wring!

Mercury moves into LEO later in the week so he gets a bit fired up, hot under the collar and volatile. Think about it from an energy point of view. Mercury in water has trouble finding his voice and expressing things until the sand swirling around in the water settles down and he settles down. Mercury in Fixed Leo Fire ROARS, FLARES and TAKES FIRE to burn away what it perceives to be disrespect, lack of loyalty, or to soothe the hurt and sensitive emotions. So first up for Mercury is the watery emotional buildup and then there is a transition and a release into ROARing lion behavior! Can you see how it we might be rocking and rolling this week?

The Sun also changes signs this week as he moves into Leo ~ I gotta be me! I gotta be me! I gotta shine! I gotta grow in my own light! I gotta do what I wanna do! I gotta go where I wanna go! Part of our work during the summer of 2008 is to clear out the old stuff that is finished that accumulated in our lives since 1995 when Pluto entered Sagittarius. We are in the process of wrapping up that larger 13 year long chapter of our lives. We are, by finishing up Pluto in Sagittarius, getting ready to move into the next major chapter, when Pluto enters Capricorn, for good, in late November. So clear out the closets. Shred the papers. Get down into that moldy, scary basement full of spiders with Clorox, a bright spotlight and a fan. Throw away. Pitch. Release. Recycle. Let go. Clear spaces and places for the new chapter of your life to take place. Clear out the old to make way for the new.

As you are clearing out the old stuff in your life, or doing what you need to do to wrap things up that began back in 1995, reflect on how much your life has changed and evolved since 1995! As a society, we “got” the internet, websites, cell phones, emails, and the ability to link ourselves around the world in an instant since 1995 as Pluto moved through the sign of publishing and communication, transforming everything he touched. We are global now, ready or not. What went global and expansive in your life since 1995? What changed about how you thought, saw the world, read or knew?

If you are in a REAL mulling mood, especially if the basement is VERY bad and going to take a very long time, go back to the even earlier Pluto sign changes ~ 1939, 1958, 1972, and 1984 to see the other major, seismic and evolutionary structural changes that took place in your life and the lives of your loved ones between those dates. You are about to have another big change! That is why these times feel so fraught and freighted with profound, deep and unsettling emotions. You aren’t imagining it. You are feeling the very earth shift under your feet ~ a low, slow, deep rumble as Pluto prepares to end his journey in the sign of Sagittarius and moves into the next sign of Capricorn.

Monday, Moon in Pisces starts the week off on an emotional footing especially as she argues with Saturn and Mars in Virgo. The story that took place around July 11, 2008 takes on a new and different meaning. Mercury has a bit of an explosion as a stone (or something) drops into his watery feelings and sets him off to flowing, rippling and generating feelings with out words. Sun is in an argument with Pluto ~ emotions versus the vision. Difficult words. The problem comes when emotions are out of whack or out of sync with vision. Then we self sabotage. There is a good chance you will self sabotage today. Get your emotions in sync with your vision. Tell them to go sit in a time out chair. I know, it isn’t easy but that is the solution to the problem. You have to let go of the fear. You have to tell that nasty little voice in your head to be quiet for a minute so you can think! Hush!!!! Hush, HUSH!!! Like a little kid that is way past bedtime and in that hyper wired, super emotional place, the best solution IS bed. Unfortunately, it is probably YOU and you are at the office so you’ll have to comfort yourself with other things. Healthy things please! Pick something HEATHY (like going to sleep or leaving the office to take some time to think and perhaps cry) to partner with.

Tuesday Mercury and Mars are wrestling in the sky so there can be sharp words, especially in emotional situations, especially around work or structure or how people choose to take action around things. Believe it when they say it. They mean it. At the same time, remember what they say might or might not be true! Regardless, that is THEIR perception of THEIR reality! It is true for THEM. Now, over on YOUR side of the room, is it true for you? Is it YOUR reality? Is it true for you? Or is a change in order? Or a break? Or a sabbatical? It is true for them. What is true for you? Can you find a common space? Can you agree to disagree? If not, no need to “end” things or do some dramatic exit scene complete with door slamming and histrionics. You have different views of the world. That is completely fine. You have a right to have your OWN world view. They have a right to have their OWN world view. Take what you agree with and leave the rest. Take what is useful and ignore the rest. Well, right now, you are not going to be able to ignore the rest but hang up the phone and talk again in a couple of days. Sun enters Leo today so we all are supposed to be the kings and queens of our unique world. You came into shine in your unique way. So go shine, with someone who likes your version of sunshine. Ignore those folks who are telling you how you should shine to make them happy. That is part of the problem right now. Let them be. They get their world view. You get your world view. Both can be right for each of you even if they are NOT right for the other person.

Wednesday Mercury is confused, depressed and upset. That, that right there is the old thing you are trying to let go of. Push on it a bit. Poke it a bit. Nudge at it with your toe ~ make sure you have a shoe on as it will gush or leak at the least provocation. See what that thing is comprised of. Venus is a bit cross with Mars as he is pointing out her flaws. People don’t want to hear how they can change things today. Folks want to wallow a bit today. Folks want to feel sorry for themselves. Let them. Feel sorry for yourself too. It is a great day to pull up that list of what makes you feel sorry for yourself! Mull on it. Cry a bit. Wail! Gnash your teeth! Now, after you’ve done that and had a good time feeling sorry for yourself, make up a companion list about what the things you feel sorry about actually gave you. Because, when you were engaged in or with those things, they actually DID do something for you! They gave you some kind of satisfaction. Maybe not so much any more ~ but back then, BOY did they satisfy something in your being. That is the part that is changing. Be gentle with yourself.

Thursday, More with the Wallow!! Wallow a bit more. Watch closely as the Wallow may morph into Righteous Indignation (a close companion to Wallow!) as the Sun is now in Leo. So make a list of all the things you did for them ~ those services, time, talents, loves, desires, hopes, dreams and energies that you gave to them. What was the wish? Make a very long list! Look at it. Now, ask yourself why did you do it? The first answer is not the one you want to focus on. Go to the next answer and the next and the next. When you get to the answer that makes tears swell up in your eyes and your throat get tight, write THAT answer down in BIG letters. That is actually why you did it. Watch for the emotions. They tell you the source of your truth. Again, poke, prod and look at it. It is your truth. When you can name it, it makes it SO much easier. You aren’t going to die. Just look at it. Look at your truth. You got something from the situation too. However, your truth is related to that part that makes you cry or feel emotional. Just hang out with it. Companion it. Recognize it as a very, very, very deep wish. If you are friendly with your deepest wish (instead of banishing it to a corner where it starts to chew on your favorite red shoes), it comes true. That is how wishes work! Honest!

Friday is an over doing day. Over doing. Over emotional. Over spending. Over the top. Over, over, over. Mercury has an inconjunct aspect to Pluto so expect an ah-ha moment. Venus has an inconjunct aspect to Jupiter so expect understanding about why you relate in the way you relate. It is all tied to that old, old, story. Once you are conscious, you can’t go back. Once you see it, you are forever changed. Carl Jung says, “What is not met in the psyche will come to us as fate”. Or perhaps Piero Ferrucci is better for today: “The factors that contributed to my growth were many - finding someone who understood me, exploring the unconscious, awakening my latent love . . . but one star is brightest among all: the Self. I found the source of livingness inside me, something I didn't even know existed."

Saturn’s day we move forward as Mercury leaves Cancer and enters the sign of Leo. The Sun rises. His passion becomes clear. He bursts out of the water of Cancer into the sunlight of Leo. We have to act in our deeper truth ~ what ever it is. We have to stand in our deeper vision of what we believe to be true for us. That is the eternal quest and purpose for our current existence. We have to be what we incarnated to be or become! When we are NOT true to ourselves, to our deeper selves, all the ills, problems and perils of the universe come flowing at us in the form of Fate. It flows at us as Fate because we are unwilling or unable to meet it in our psyche! Meet it! Embrace it! Love it! Start today! It is part of you! It is part of your being. The universe is trying to get you to reclaim it. Wrap your arms around it like a long lost friend and invite it in for tea and biscuits.

Sunday we have gifts of brilliance today so make sure to note the ideas, thoughts or people that appear in your life. Venus dives into the South node late in the day so something very old and very profound can leave you, including something you love or loved dearly. Release it. Bless it. Thank it. Know you are releasing it to move onto your next chapter. All part of the cycle of love, life and incarnation. Remember to breath. Call someone you love and tell them. Write the letter you’ve been meaning to write to say thank you. Repair the broken relationship. You can also pull something profound INTO your life today. First, perhaps, a new relationship with yourself and a new way of loving who you are. It can also come in as a new love, new companion, or new beloved dream that you want to pursue. Give yourself permission to welcome it into your life. It marks the beginning of a new cycle of love for you.

Mundane: Phil Gramm had to step down as National General Co-Chair of John McCain’s Presidential Campaign after calling us, his fellow American citizens, a Nation of Whiners. Of course, Phil created and defended the Enron Loophole legislation that allows speculation on gas prices ~ part of why we pay $4 per gallon. Phil lobbied for a Swiss bank involved with the mortgage crisis while thousands of Americans’ lost their homes. Phil helped defeat Clintons’ proposal for Universal Health care ~ allowing corporations to further squeeze and profit off our illness and medical needs. Phil wrote McCain‘s economic policy for his proposed upcoming Presidency which says leave everything just as it is ~ we Republicans like that the corporations are making unregulated profits even as the rest of us working Americans struggle to pay our bills! So what brings Phil down? He called the rest of us whiners and complainers!

Truth be told, Phil only gave voice to what the dear little Republicans, with their Corporate Bosses and business lobbyists, want for the rest of us ~ too broke, tired and beaten down from working multiple jobs to pay attention to the continued looting of America. Frankly, I loved it. It was definitely Phil’s Marie Antoinette’s “Let them eat cake!” moment.

That is the thing about greed. It grows. Greed is never satisfied. Every embezzler or thief gets caught either because they are sloppy or their greed grows WAY out of proportion and is noticed by someone who can do something about it. How much money do they actually NEED? Can they even spend it all? No, of course not. It is about the accumulation, the excess, the overdoing. And, as we all enter Pluto in Capricorn together, the greedy ones and the rest of us, we all get to work with Pluto in Capricorn energy. We last visited Pluto in Capricorn in the 1700s, between 1762 and 1778. In the months (and years) ahead, we will see increasing signs of the coming revolution(s). The French and American Revolutions took place when Pluto was last in Capricorn. The revolutions took place to correct excesses and imbalances. As we all know, history repeats itself. Get a system too out of balance and, eventually, the pendulum swings the other way.

Barack Obama has very dangerous aspects in his chart this week. The last time these aspects took place was late May 2008 when Hillary Clinton said the Bobby Kennedy assassination in June was a reason to quit the race. The media roared. As Obama’s drawn numerous personal, public and media analogies to both Kennedys, Martin Luther King and Abraham Lincoln AND we are having a redo of 1968 when two of those four killings happened, please say extra prayers for his personal safety this week, regardless of whether you support his candidacy or not. I don’t want those two little girls attending a funeral!

The emotional Moon in Pisces sets off the recent Mars/ Saturn union in Virgo so the stock market should respond with emotion to the news it receives early in the week. Further worried actions will be taken Wednesday and Thursday as Mars in Virgo rules that Moon in Aries. People are feeling their security is under attack and NOT happy about it. Continued volatility can be expected.

Update: Thanks to almost 500 of you for checking out the brand new pod casts on my site. I’ve worked with Heather Roan-Robbins and Mark Wolz for a few years now. We speak every week on the Cosmic Weather at East West Bookstore here in New York City. It seemed like a great idea to spread the astrological wealth to a wider range of people who can’t stop by the book store for a cup of tea and astrology! Enjoy!

I will be sending out a newsletter this week so make sure to add your name to the mailing list if I don't already have it. Use the tab on the menu on the site.

Copyright © 2008 Anne Ortelee All Rights Reserved.

Posted by Anne Ortelee at 02:41 PM | Permalink

Full Moon July 18, 2008

26:04 Capricorn Moon, Cancer Sun

3:59 am EDT

0:59 am PDT

This month’s Full Moon took place deep in the night on the east coast of the USA. It has a number of stressful aspects in the lunation chart, asking us to be conscious of how we take action and what we choose to partner with.

Now we find Saturn is recently joined with Mars in Virgo. Time to open up our rock polishing kit and see what we’ve ground into bits, which rocks are shiny, and if some rocks had faults in their being and cracked into pieces while tumbling in the rock grinder. Think of the lessons you’ve learned since January 2007. At that time, Neptune and Saturn were dancing together in an opposition and wrecking havoc and dissolving things in your Leo/Neptune houses. Now, Neptune has moved onto the North Node to pull you, push you, move you forward to your next chapter. When we opened up this New Moon cycle, Uranus was on the North Node, requesting or causing change, creation, creativity and chaos. Now we have Neptune on the North Node asking us to follow our dreams and hopes, with faith towards our future. At the same time, keep on releasing things in your Leo house in preparation for your new life arriving soon in your Capricorn ~ earth house.

We started a new two year cycle last Thursday, with Saturn in the sign of changeable earth joining with Mars in changeable earth. Virgo polishes quickly, with panache and a flair. It is time for a new bucket of rocks for our rock polisher ~ a quick bucket. Maybe a fine tune of a previous bucket. This bunch of rocks will polish up VERY quickly. The Full Moon today precedes the upcoming eclipse that will RELEASE the last remnants of fear and anxiety from January 2007. You will profit from things begun back in that month too. The things that you‘ve been working on since January 2007 will come to ripen and grow before you very eyes. So say “Yes! Yes! I am here” to the offers from the Universe that might come your way.

The Full Moon also has a t-square between Neptune, Chiron, Pallas and the South Node. I know I sound like a broken record on this one, but, once again, the energy point to what we partner with we create. There will be a tendency to partner with the wounds on this one. Pallas is in square to the Nodal Axis. That means we have an “opportunity” as my boss liked to call it, to go higher or lower, evolve or de-evolve, rise or sink, resurrect or start to die. We’ll have an opportunity to go North Node or South Node. If you go North Node, you might, might, just might, run into a very old wound ~ one of those darker wounds of your soul. If it dances around you, join it in the dance. Understand how that old wound got you to where you are now. If you hadn’t had it, you might not be the person standing before you in the mirror. Now I know, the old wounds can be a bit hard to take. That said, they were what shaped you. You don’t have to hang on to them quite so tight.

Part of living in human form is feeling fear and being afraid. We are, quite rightly, naturally afraid of what hurts us. Pain is what lets us know we are in a situation that maybe isn’t where we should be, stay, linger or hang out. However, YOU ARE SO MUCH WISER NOW! You are so much younger than the old you that was so deeply hurt.

You’ve come to understand HOW the wounds of your past created the you before you. You don’t have to hold them to your breast like a frigging shield, guarding you from living your best life. You can look at the wounds and say to yourself “So what did I learn from THAT experience? How did it teach my soul? How does it reflect the past experiences that I had when I was little to show me a different version of the SAME experience? Who from my early life and childhood did it remind me of? What would I say to myself if I ran into the same experience today? Where does the current experience take me back to? When I go back do I make a choice on the CURRENT situation or am I pulling up the OLD situation and choosing from that place? Actually what DID you say if you ran into the ghost from then during the recent Mercury retrograde if that particular ghost or memory came back?

You are actually right where you are supposed to be, based on the choices you’ve made in your life. If you don’t like where you are, change your choices. You didn’t get there, where you are, over night. It took a lifetime of choices to create what you have before you. If you don‘t like what you have, choose differently the next time you are offered choices. Step into those options boldly. Feel the fear rise. (Know that it is OLD fear!). Watch the fear dance before you. Take a deep breath. Ask yourself if the fear is real or if some one is trying to get you to stop, leave, change or not be your true essence. Tell the negative voice in your head that if it can’t say something nice to you to be quiet already. Take a teeny, tiny step forward towards what you want. Watch the fear abate. See how easy it is? Ask yourself the who, what, where, when, why and how questions about your fear, especially as it reminds you of the triggers from your past. It isn‘t your past. It is your future. Made one choice at a time, and starting now.

Capricorn Moons, New, Quarters or Full, remind us that the responsibility for our choices rests entirely with us. We can continue to blame our mothers, fathers, rotten luck, terrible charts, bad bosses, difficult kids, badly trained dogs or Saturn in what ever house it lives in. Or we can get to know Saturn. We can ask Saturn what we are to do to change our life. If we listen, in our deepest heart, we actually DO know what we need to do. Then, we have to take the most small and basic of action to be the change we want to be in the world.

On this lovely Full Moon in late Capricorn, have a heart to heart chat with your Saturn. Deal with the Saturn issue before you. Just do it as the Nike ad says. If you do it, you’ve done the step. You’ve made Saturn happy. And, the next time you are faced with the same choice, remember you DO have a choice. You DO have an option. It is your life. Forward you go.

Lynda Hills interpretation of the Sabian Image for the Moon in Capricorn is A MOUNTAIN PILGRIMAGE

Commentary: ‘A Mountain Pilgrimage’ shows the human need to strive further, to go places that few people go and to take risks in the hope of reaching a somewhat “exalted” place. Taken literally, a ‘Mountain Pilgrimage’ can be difficult, risky and even downright life threatening, especially to those who are old, frail, in ill health or simply unfit. However, the ‘Pilgrimage’ can manifest on many levels, from wanting to reach and attain the “highest office” in a company or a country, all the way to desiring and striving the ascension to higher levels of other-worldly or spiritual attainment.

Oracle: In the situation facing you, there may be a need to strive and to learn more on your path to understanding and fulfillment. You may feel the desire to follow those who have gone before you in order to achieve a true sense of inner fulfillment and achievement. The effort that you have to expend is sometimes great, but, then, so can be the rewards. A keen sense of ambition that knows few limitations or boundaries, can lead to the top, even though it might be a steep climb. This ‘Pilgrimage’ can signal the need to get back to the purer elements of life and finding one’s spiritual grounding. The effort involved in the ‘Mountain Pilgrimage’ can take you away from friends and family, and those things that have been familiar and comforting to you. However, you may be surrounded, sometimes above and sometimes below, by people who share the same hopes and visions. These aren’t necessarily the friends and family that you are used to sharing your life with, but people you meet up with on the journey. Still, this may be a lonely journey, whether you are with others or not. Regardless, keep striving – it may be well worth the time and effort as you work to reach your own ‘Mountain’ top.

Keywords: Ascent in consciousness. Spiritual, material, corporate or political striving. Having an entourage of people (or wanting one). Aloneness and separation. Setting off to somewhere. Going on a mission. Finding one’s spiritual grounding. Getting back to the purer elements in life. Pure elements.

The Caution: High moral stands with no depth of feeling. Feeling “high above” others. Feelings of being, or acting like, an ascended being. Haughtiness. Intellectual snobbery. People scrambling for the top. The “tall poppy” syndrome.

Lynda Hill’s interpretation of the Sabian image for Cancer Sun is A VIOLENT STORM IN A RESIDENTIAL CANYON FILLED WITH EXPENSIVE HOMES

Commentary: ‘A Violent Storm in a Canyon Filled With Expensive Homes’ shows that a ‘Storm’ has suddenly released its fury on those in its path. The ‘Weather’ that has been unleashed can reflect actual weather, or psychological or emotional conditions. The ‘Homes’ need not be ‘Expensive’, but are places that are “valuable” to the occupants, they usually feel protected and safe. Somehow, a ‘Storm’ has raged through and exactly what will happen next may be rather uncertain.

Oracle: You may find yourself much deeper in a situation than you may have imagined, and now you are caged by the “walls” around you. There is probably no immediate escape from the turbulence that is happening. You may have had some forewarning that this ‘Storm’ was coming; with pressure piling up, threatening to explode at any moment. You may have had no intention or made no particular movements to invoke this ‘Storm’, however it’s out of hand in your environment nonetheless. The best thing to do is to wait it out and protect yourself, and those around you. Although this may have been building for days, or years, many are often taken by surprise at the sudden turn of events or the intensity of what’s being unleashed. An event or something that was said has let loose a torrent of emotional and physical energy that can be hard to contain. In fact, endeavoring to contain it may result in more damage. Things probably need to blow themselves out naturally. A positive outcome may not come to light for awhile, but things will fall back where they are meant to, in the end. Look back to see what you’ve contributed, as it may help to see a way out, or at least reconcile what’s happened. It’s likely that a number of people have been affected. It may be a disaster, or it may end up being a blessing in some way. See if you can rebuild your community – some people may have to be left out of your life, however.

Keywords: Arguments and emotional confrontations. The “pressure cooker” environments of modern-day living. Psychic energy unleashed. Furious emotions. Changing the status quo. Bad weather and its consequences. Rebuilding from the foundations. Living in canyons. Being surrounded by mountainous peaks. The awesome power of nature.

The Caution: Wrongly believing that you are in control of the uncontrollable. Enjoyment of emotional storms and turmoil. Lots of noise that erupts out of nowhere. Whipping things up. Life-threatening behavior. Confrontations. Storm fronts. Social upheavals. Disturbing or violent reactions.

Copyright © 2008 Anne C. Ortelee All Rights Reserved

Lynda Hill’s interpretation of the Sabian Symbols appears with her permission. Check her work out at http://www.sabiansymbols.typepad.com or http://www.sabiansymbols.com

Posted by Anne Ortelee at 01:43 AM | Permalink

Weekly Weather July 14, 2008

It’s going to be an emotional, emotional Mercury kind of week. All sorts of EMOTIONAL yet interesting communications, illuminations, news, understandings and connections will take place this week as Mercury makes a number of aspects, by declination and zodiac, to the various planets in that dissolving and separating Finger of God in the sky. I know, I know, you are getting tired of hearing about the Finger! Tired, weary, drained, sick of it already and totally up for something new and exciting to arrive in your life. On some level, your old life is so over. On another level, your new life hasn’t, isn’t, won’t seem to start.

Mercury promises us interesting points of view this week as he moves through silent, deep feeling, highly emotional, fast action taking but security conscious ways and methods Cancer. Mercury’s aspect by declination to the various planets in the Finger of God will allow us to emotionally process all the changes we’ve been going through since the middle of May when the Finger first started to form in the sky and activated our Aquarian house as well as our new life direction. The Finger released things in our Leo house that no longer served us, were finished or were a part of our old life that were completed for us to be able to move forward.

The planets in the heavens are expanding around the chart like a giant fan ~ scattering the energy across the houses in your chart. That means it is up to you to focus your energy on wrapping up the projects that were begun in 1995. Whatever outstanding items from that time that still remain uncompleted need to be worked on, finished, codified, transitioned and released so you can move forward in September toward the next chapter of your life.

The second thing to focus on is the house where Saturn and Mars joined last week ~ 5 Virgo. That was the area where you were feeling touchy, annoyed, blocked or irritated by. The irritated spot is the part of you that wants to grow now. New shoots will be appearing soon! You are so not in the mood for the old version of how you handled that situation. It is time to let the new you, including your new method for handling it, out into the world. The irritated space is actually what you need to let yourself do, be or have more of! It is time for you to not be afraid to show it, see it or say it! It is time for you to send your energy out into the world in a new form. I’ll cover this aspect and how to work with it in more depth in my newsletter this month. Make sure to sign up for my newsletter on my website using the “Join my Mailing List” tab. It is free.

Fortunately, we are almost through with Saturn’s lessons about the story that started last fall around change, release, details, work, health, lists and problems. We are getting ready to move forward in our new direction. That also means the irritation from last week will be ending and changing too. There is just a bit more to go! A bit more stuff to slog through until it is finished. We have to get Saturn in Virgo past the degree of his station from last December (8:34 Virgo) to be on to new and exciting (Saturn and exciting?! In the same sentence? Well yes, in this case, exciting IS the proper word!) things, adventures as well as the next chapter of your life.

We have a Full Moon at 26 Capricorn on Friday speaking to our illumination and vision as she brightens the heavens above us. The Sabian image for our Cancer Sun is A furious storm rages through a residential canyon, bringing to my mind the burning fires in California as well as the mortgage crisis in our country. The Sabian image for the Capricorn Full Moon is A mountain pilgrimage. It is time for us to sit on a mountain to see what we see ~ gently observe it. No judgments. Just observe. Be an acolyte of the heavens. Observe. Assist. Pay attention. Read the full moon report on the website later this week.

Finally, we start to enter the summer eclipse season. The eclipses are coming! The eclipses are coming! After the Full Moon, we begin our two week approach to the New Moon Eclipse on the south node. It promises to be a potent eclipse! It is a total eclipse that runs over the Arctic circle as well as through China ~ just in time for the Olympics! Quoting from Bernadette Brady‘s book, “The Eagle and the Lark”, the 10 South Series concerns itself with breaking out of a very negative situation where no hope can be seen to a more positive space containing many options. A worry that may have been affecting a person will suddenly clear. The solution is shown by the cosmos and needs to be taken up without too much delay.

So we have a lot on our plate! Remember to focus the energy on what you can actually DO something about. Skip the other stuff ~ don’t pay it any mind. You’ll get to figure out what you want to do with it in a bit. Let the eclipse energy bring it all to light so you can see it more clearly. Clear up the lingering stuff hanging around since 1995. Vision the next chapter starting soon. Watch for volatile emotions as Mercury is in sensitive water and the Moon is Out of Bounds during the early part of the week. As my friend Michael said, “If we didn’t have change, there wouldn’t be butterflies!”

Monday, the moon is out of bounds in Sagittarius today making the day a bit more emotional and over the top. Mercury and Saturn are working together, trying to figure out their plan of how to work with the new building, gathering and moving forward cycle that started last Thursday when Mars and Saturn got together to start a new two year cycle. Make a list of what you want to accomplish in the next two years! Sun’s easy flowing aspect to Uranus suggests creative ideas and activities are part of the picture. Take the risk! Say yes! Sun is setting off, by an easy aspect, part of the Finger of God. The sky’s energy suggests you trust in the process and say yes to offers arriving at your door or in your mail box.

Tuesday, the Moon is still out of bounds today making the day more emotional and over the top. Mercury works with Mars today to get his take on the cycle he began last week with Saturn. Yesterday Mercury was working with Saturn. If you didn’t make your list yesterday, make your list today of what you want to accomplish in the next two years. It will ONLY TAKE YOU FIVE MINUTES! Do it while Mercury, the messenger is talking to Mars and Saturn. Mercury is the guy who delivers the messages to the rest of the heavens so make sure he has a clear picture of what you want to accomplish. Moon makes aspects to the Finger of God offering us the opportunity to process emotionally the changes that landed on our doorstep in May and June. All part of the releasing and getting ready to move into your next phase. Gotta get the old out for the new to arrive! Kind of like clearing that tree out of the back where you want to plant the rose garden. Gotta take the tree out. Gotta live with the space to see what you see. THEN you can plant the rose garden. Mercury aspects Neptune and Jupiter today, bringing us back to that Finger of God, asking you to focus your vision a bit higher. What would you do if you knew you could not fail? Again, Michael’s wisdom comes into play ~ “Are you only focusing on the LENGTH of your life and not the WIDTH of your life?” What do you want to make wider in your life? Sun has an adjusting aspect to Neptune ~ to make your life WIDER ~ you need to have a vision of BEING WIDER. What does a wider life look like? Creatively envision the pattern of your life expanding to create that WIDER vision. What do you need to weave into your life to make it wider?

Wednesday, the Moon is still out of bounds ~ yes, still emotional. Hey, creation involves emotion. Why do you think they ask you do test drive the car? Once you sit behind the steering wheel, you emotionally attach to the darn car with your limbic system in your brain. Spend time with it, feel the emotions build. Touch it, want it. Today Venus has gifts of brilliance and creativity with Pallas and Pluto ~ take the vision and dig into a step of it today. Just a teeny tiny step! Mercury is aspecting the Sun and the Nodes by declination. Mercury is found in his fast moving water energy so all communications naturally have emotions attached to them. Emotions are part of creation! Let them spin a POSITIVE creative vision for you. If it tends to go negative (and it might), crush the negative thoughts and replace them with POSITVE emotions. The Universe is in the mood to grow things ~ good or bad things ~ it is going to be growing things. So send out good emotions!

Thursday, the Moon is still out of bounds. Yep, still we are emotional! Verklempt even! What did you expect? I told you it was going to be one of those emotional kind of weeks! Did you think I was kidding? Time for us to adjust our partnerships with what we create. Time for us to see how our choices create our lives. Freud said that our unconscious often creates situations for us to become conscious. So, as you think about the headlines in the news, apply them to your life. As you think about the stories in your life, particularly over the past two months, apply the stories to your life. What did you get emotional about? What do you feel about A-Rod, C-Rod, Lenny, Madonna, the kids and the Kabala? How does their story compare to Christy Brinkley and Peter Cook? As you watched the fires and the firefighters in California, did it remind you of how exhausted you are? As you watched Tim Russert or George Carlin funerals, what were your emotions. As whoever left your world left, how did you feel? As whoever moved away, moved, how did you feel? Pull it up. Look at it in the larger context of your life and your future. Venus says the clearing out of the old coals in the hearth, while troubling, a loss, a completion and perhaps sad and happy at the same time, lets a new fire have a good, clean hearth in which to take root and burn brightly. Vision what that new fire looks like. How wide is it? How long? How tall? How bright? Again, apply the emotions to your vision of what you want. What DO you want? What is not in your life that you’d like more of? How can you add that? How can you make your life wider?

Friday read the Full Moon report on this site for more information on how to deal with the energy of the Full Moon. It is a lovely moon ~ full of promise and hope for the next chapter even as the old chapter closes. Mercury aspects the wounds of the Finger of God as well as backing away and looking clearly at the vision ~ either for good or bad ~ of what it can be, what it was and what it could be. Emotions can run very high today. Again, remember to create a POSITIVE vision of what you want. Venus is in the mood to pick a fight out of no where because she’s been feeling neglected.

Saturn’s day Moon in Aquarius speaks to a sense of community and connection. Mercury is AGAIN with the planets in the Finger of God. He also joins with Ceres. Remember what we partner with we create. What we nurture grows in our garden and our life. If we water, prune, weed and tend it, it GROWS! What are you sending your energy toward? What are you growing in your life? What is getting wider? What do you WANT to get wider?

Sunday Moon occults Neptune, bringing more emotions to the surface. And we’ve only just started our approach to the eclipses! Mercury is again aspecting that dissolving Finger ~ Neptune and the North Node. Before anything can happen, the vision needs to be in place. Whether it is building a better mousetrap or designing a rocket that takes you to the moon, the IDEA was the first thing that happened. Go get your list from Monday and Tuesday, when Mercury was aspecting Saturn and Mars. Now that you’ve had a week to process the purpose of the Finger of God and the changes it created in your life, revisit that list and see if there is anything you would like to add to it. Vision. It all starts with a vision!

UPDATE: As you probably noticed when you stopped by for your weekly astrology update, there are changes to my website! First, the background color ~ cream ~ it seemed to be a bit easier on the eyes.

Mundane: The financial story and outlook is going to start to change now that Mars joined with Saturn at 5 Virgo making critical aspects in the USA, NYSE and Federal Reserve charts on Thursday, July 10^th. The FDIC prevented a run on IndyMac Bancorp Inc.. The bank was taken over by the government on Friday, July 11, 2008. On Sunday, July 13, 2008 the U.S. government said “No more bailouts!” The eclipse in March was when the USA government started the unprecedented bailout of the financial institutions by opening the doors to the Federal Reserve and giving away money. Now, that Saturn and Mars have triggered the eclipse degrees and started a new two year cycle of Virgo dotting the “I”s and crossing the “t”s, we can expect a different response.

From the internet: The U.S. government is signaling it won't throw a lifeline to struggling financial companies — except for mortgage linchpins Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — marking a shift to a new and potentially more volatile phase of the credit crisis.

Such an approach could mean beaten-down investment banks like Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and regional banks must now fend for themselves as they try to recover from billions of dollars in mortgage-related losses — unlike Bear Stearns Cos., whose buyout the government helped orchestrate in March. That is bound to unnerve an already turbulent Wall Street and make investors even more anxious as they await financial companies' earnings expected to be down a stunning 69 percent from a year ago when all the numbers are in.

The short-term uncertainty about Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae — which together hold or guarantee half the nation's mortgage debt — was to an extent relieved on Sunday. Federal officials again threw their support behind the government-sponsored enterprises; the Treasury pledged to expand its current line of credit to the two companies and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson also said the government could, if needed, buy equity capital in the companies, whose stocks lost half their value last week. The Treasury's moves would require congressional approval.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve said it will provide additional loans if needed.

But some of Wall Street's biggest investors believe there was another message in the government's announcement — the rest of the financial sector seems unlikely to get a helping hand. Global banks and brokerages have already written down nearly $300 billion in soured mortgage investments — a number projected to ultimately reach $1 trillion.

"The credit crisis has obviously entered into a new phase — the government has one bailout left in them, and this is it," said Jeffrey Gundlach, chief investment officer of TCW Group in Los Angeles, which invests $160 billion.

"One consequence of Freddie and Fannie is that other firms are allowed to go under," he said. "If you couldn't get your act together after four months of unprecedented financing terms, maybe you don't deserve to be thrown yet another lifeline."

Worries about financial companies failing intensified after a run on IndyMac Bancorp Inc. led to the bank's takeover by the government on Friday. It wasn't the Treasury or Fed helping to keep IndyMac in business, but a transfer of control to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. — which backs deposits on all the nation's banks.

On Wall Street, Monday could be a critical day, with investors quite nervous amid the uncertainty in the financial sector. Friday, as investors tried to assess the health of the mortgage financiers, the Dow Jones industrial average dropped below 11,000 for the first time in nearly two years, and the overall market was left with its fourth straight weekly loss. The government's support of Fannie and Freddie in part was meant to assuage investors around the world.

Wall Street will get a better sense of how concerned investors are with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's future immediately Monday morning. Freddie Mac is scheduled to hold its weekly debt auction beginning at 8 a.m. EDT. The auction closes at 9:45 a.m., shortly after U.S. markets open.

Successful completion of the debt auctions allows both lenders to remain liquid — replacing old debt with new. Liquidity has been one of the key questions facing financial companies during the credit crisis.

Freddie Mac is auctioning off a combined $3 billion in three- and six-month securities. Wall Street will be looking very closely at the number of bidders and the rate at which the securities are auctioned, said Bert Ely, a banking consultant who has been critical of the companies in the past.

The banking industry was already dealt a severe blow in March when Bear Stearns nearly collapsed amid the evaporation of its liquidity. JPMorgan Chase & Co. stepped in to purchase Bear Stearns in a deal orchestrated by the Federal Reserve.

Bear Stearns was unhinged by mounting losses tied to investments in bonds backed by mortgages. As the mortgages increasingly defaulted, the value of bonds backed by the troubled loans tumbled. After Bear collapsed, investment banks were given the opportunity to borrow directly from the Fed, an option that was previously only granted to retail banks.

Financial companies' reports of write-downs of troubled debt are likely to increase this week as some of the country's largest institutions, including JPMorgan Chase, Merrill Lynch & Co. and Citigroup Inc., report second-quarter results. That trio has already taken a combined $73 billion in write-downs since the credit crisis began last summer.

Lehman Brothers, whose shares have lost 78 percent since this year's peak in February, is considered to be on the shakiest ground because it is the smallest Wall Street bank and has significant mortgage holdings. Last month, the investment bank announced it lost nearly $3 billion during the second quarter and was forced to offset that by raising $6 billion of fresh capital.

Meanwhile, analysts believe regional banks in areas hardest hit by the real estate downturn are also at risk for failure. Some of the most bandied about names include Washington Mutual Inc., National City Corp., and Fifth Third Bancorp.

"Fannie and Freddie are too big to fail only because of the repercussions, not to just the mortgage and housing markets but the entire financial market," said Joe Balestrino, fixed-income market strategist at Federated Investors. "The U.S. is in disarray ... these regionals could be gone, they are in a tough spot with housing and employment going south."

Copyright © 2008 Anne Ortelee All Rights Reserved.

Posted by Anne Ortelee at 01:36 AM | Permalink

Weekly Weather July 7, 2008

Going to be a big, and probably a difficult, week ahead. Mars the planet of action is joining with Saturn the planet of structures, limits, karma (and all those lovely fears and anxieties on a bad day), to start a new 2 year cycle in your chart in your Virgo house on July 10th. Until Mars gets to Saturn, the pressure is going to build. Mars Saturn aspects often show as blockages to taking action, even if we want to.

To my mind, although Saturn went into Virgo last September, we officially START the transit of Saturn through Virgo now! Once Mars joins up with Saturn, it officially starts. Up until now, we‘ve been wrapping up the Saturn/Mars in Leo transit from June 18, 2006 at 8 Leo. The very emotional New Moon last week set off the PREVIOUS Mars/ Saturn cycle, from May 25, 2004, which took place at 11 Cancer. And truth be told, we actually, probably and completely should go two more cycles, back to April /May 2000, when Mars joined Saturn at 17 Taurus a month before Jupiter did ~ starting a new 20 year cycle about what we want to create in our lifetime.

These smaller cycles are part and parcel of the larger cycles. Mars to Saturn is a cycle that seeds our action principle with our structure, karma and building principles. In six months from now, we’ll have a test. In 12 months from now, the cycle will reach an opposition so we can see what it becomes. And 6 months after that, or 18 months from now, we begin to harvest what we start this week.

So, this week, the universe is going to turn to us and have a cosmic chat about what we’ve created in our lives and what we‘d like to create going forward. We have a “challenging opportunity”, as my old boss liked to call it, a task or assignment to get on with. It is time for us to get on with the next building part, time to create the next structure in our life. That we will start after the 10^th. First, this week, comes the release as Mars, wraps up the old cycle and pushes his energy into Saturn. Mars nudges Saturn to let something go. Or as Saturn, sits, firm and solid in his bulk, obstruction and fear seeking to block old Mars from going past him. For you sports fans, think tackling linebacker and quarterback. It is time to release the last dregs of the cycle begun in your Leo house in June of 2006 this week.

As luck or synchronicity would have it, a rainy July 4^th turned a planned pool day into a hanging out in the kitchen, talking and laughing day with my friend Sharon. Sharon had a new book, which had an exercise which I found particularly insightful. It is from Hale Dwoskin and called the Sedona Method. As you probably know, Sedona has lovely vortexes that people use to release or call things in. This exercise seemed to function as a quick vortex. An a fairly cool and easy vortex to activate ~ especially between steps 3 and 4.

It consists of 5 steps. Apply the Sedona Method to the old limiting beliefs, feelings, issues or fears that will be dancing up in front of your nose this week. And trust me, they will be dancing. Actually, they’ve been dancing since the New Moon but now we have something to work with to help us release them. First up, you have to initiate. Start by activating the energy by thinking about that fear or thing you are struggling with.

1. What am I feeling now? Identify the feeling energy as it appears.

2. Could I welcome and allow it? Argue for or accept both sides or versions of the energy.

3. Could I let it go? Either Yes or No are acceptable answers.

4. WOULD I let it go? Am I willing to let it go? Would I rather have the feeling I have or be free?

5. When? Let that one sit a bit. Letting go is a decision.

I loved the beauty of it. The simplicity. The things in your and my life exist for a reason. We get things ~ values, validation, aliveness, sadness, joy, sorrow, abundance, safety, whatever, from the things we attach our feelings to. What we attach our feelings to, we give meaning to. Our negative feelings often feel more powerful than our positive feelings. Actually they are not ~ they are all feelings ~ just feelings. We label them as positive or negative. But they are only charged energy from our brain’s perspective.

What happens in our brains when we think about either the negative stuff or the positive stuff is we chemically change our brain. We activate it. We change it. Our thoughts create chemical changes in our brains. We either activate our brain or calm it down. This method seems to shift the process a bit~ and add an ability to step out of our own way. Try it a few times on easy stuff and then move to the harder stuff. Remember to belly breath if your anxiety starts to rise.

We also have a couple of planets changing signs as Venus goes into Leo and Mercury enters Cancer. The Sun and Venus set off the Finger of God. And Mercury, has a whopping big aspect with Pluto in Sagittarius. We can expect a bit of turbulence as we start to take off into Saturn in Virgo, for real, for true, for finally, and for the next two years. Hang on. Breathe. And release the fear or the fearful thoughts using the Sedona Method out lined above as Mars pushes against Saturn. Remember the pushing builds all week until we get to the 10^th when it peaks. Release, release, and release.

Monday, Venus has an adjusting aspect to the dream of Neptune and to the Finger of God. Think back on June’s adventure with the Finger as Venus asks you to live in the moment, fully present. Feel your feelings. Venus joins with Mars by sky declination ~ activating a very big amount of energy to help us move forward. What we desire we create ~ even in the strange form before you what you desired was created. You can change it. You start by changing your desire to keep hanging on to it. Virgo Moon offers the opportunity to power through your to-do list. Get the stuff out the door and into the world. Wrap up! Wrap up!

Tuesday, Sun has an adjusting energy to Juno. One of the
“bad” things about New Age philosophy is that tendency to “blame” ourselves for some how creating what we have in our lives as well as the situations we find ourselves in. The whole mindset of “it is a video and you are the film maker.” In some senses, that vision of reality is true. However, I know when I see a pretty yucky planetary configuration starting to form in a chart that the solid earthy versions of the energies took a long time to get there AND they carry with them all the decisions, emotions, ideas, choices and actions of the past. That is how things come into form. Little seeds planted long, long ago grow and bloom like weeds in a garden or flowers deliberately planted. Thought, inspiration, and emotion to voila ~ we have creation. It isn’t magic. It is, often, the result of choices made and actions taken (or not taken). We don’t like to think that. We aren’t taught to think like that. Today and tomorrow’s aspects are going to be saying, “Yep, time to think that way.” Our choices now come from our earlier actions. Our opportunity to change is here. Sun has an adjusting aspect to Juno. Mercury is talking to Saturn ~ take and make your choices wisely today. Weigh both sides of the situation.

Wednesday ~ reread Tuesday. Sun is opposite to Jupiter ~ setting off that Finger of God. Sun is in a gift aspect to Neptune and again setting off the Finger of God. While it may not be clear what you want to do ~ leap toward your future. Say yes to your dreams. Release your fears. Release your anxieties. Release those limiting beliefs ~ musicians can’t make money, I can’t be an actress, I’ll never find love, I didn’t ask for this situation before me. Perhaps not. Perhaps. Regardless, WOULD you? WOULD you be willing to let it go? Are you willing to let it go? Would you rather have the feeling and situation or be free? When? Let that one sit a bit. Letting go is a decision. Chiron’s square to Pallas speaks to the pattern. Character and our choices are all we control. Moon in Libra is indecisive. We only have our actions. That is what we can control. Take actions to move the situation along.

Thursday the proverbial shit hits the fan. There are a bunch of aspects. As they say in the news business, it is NOT a slow news day! As well as many planet changes, Moon makes a number of aspects too. Mercury is opposite to Pluto pushing you, your thoughts, your mind, your agreement, your choices to the next level ~ perhaps with a bit of confrontation. Mars joins with Saturn. The new two year cycle starts today! Ready or not! Saturn in Virgo is officially in the room! Mercury enters Cancer and immediately leaps into a highly emotional and none too clear style of communicating. Plus he’s still stinging from his face off with Pluto. Highly profound emotions but not clear. If you can, let the emotions settle. Mercury is in cardinal, action taking emotional water ~ the inclination will be to take action from a deep seated emotion. I say do take action if it serves your higher intention, the greater good, the highest form of caring and compassion of what you said you wanted to do in your life time or moves you forward on your path. Take action even if you aren’t 100% sure how to get there from where you are right now. Not to worry, the path will appear before you when you are ready to move down it. DO NOT TAKE action if you are doing it from a place of fear, anxiety or negative emotions. Be still until the water and emotions settle down and you can see clearly. In the meantime, redirect that emotional energy to work on the stuff you can do something about. Work on the stuff in front of you right now. Work on wrapping up the 1995 stuff that is lingering on your desk, hanging in the closet and not part of your future. Sun has an adjusting aspect to the Node ~ some times our dreams are dancing in clothes we don’t recognize. Today might be such a day.

Friday Mercury pushes off Venus ~ normally friends, Mercury and Venus are fighting. Or perhaps taking action towards their dreams which are, right now, moving in separate directions. Sun sets off Chiron in the Finger of God as Mercury also fights or faces off with Mars by declination. Be cautious about your words today as they will be extra potent. It is a good day to launch out towards your dreams today. There is an abundance of energy dancing around for things to hook on to. That said, the launch might make for a slightly bumpy ride as there is a lot of energy. Dreams often require fuel. Lots of fuel in the air. Moon in Scorpio adds extra passion and drama to the day. Criticism (from yesterday too) is rampant. Breath. Take productive actions.

Saturn’s day Venus has an aspect with Pluto that asks her to adjust her (and his) vision of what is going to be. Live in the moment. Release. Release those last fears of yours. What would you do if you knew you could not fail? What would you do? WOULD you? Are you willing to go for it? Would you rather be afraid or be free? Start today. Start to do it today. Venus enters Leo so it is a great day to pursue your dreams ~ bumping and bouncing, down the road toward them you go. Moon in Scorpio is ruled by Mars in Virgo ~ so create a master list and tackle it, tackle it, tackle it!

Sunday Mercury has a shocking aspect with Uranus and the nodes. This will offer you a unique way of looking at things and seeing things you never saw before. Or it could be fight with siblings or words. Pay attention. Uranus is part of the Finger of God. Once you see your attachment to the situation, you can never go back to NOT seeing it. It has been pointed out to you. Kind of like finding out about Santa Claus or figuring out your partner is having an affair. Things are shifting before your eyes, even as you watch. Venus is saying she didn’t MEAN to create the situation by her actions. No she (and you) didn’t mean to. Or it happened and now she feels bad about it. Or maybe she DID mean to create it but doesn’t want to own it. That is okay. You don’t have to KEEP doing it. That is the important thing to remember. You have to BE different. If you are different, it, the situation, your life, will shift too. Be what you want it to be. Again, this is a rocking and rolling set of aspects today. Lots of gifts but lots of stress too. Focus on the gifts and the vision of where you want to go. It starts with a step. Today, take your first one. Your first step of your new life. Forward!

Mundane: Lots of volatility in the stock market and with the dollar. Watch for consequences of actions taken to show up this week for all sorts of people. This is one of those weeks when the newspapers are hopping with scoops, scoops, and more scoops!

Copyright © 2008 Anne Ortelee All Rights Reserved.

Posted by Anne Ortelee at 10:55 PM | Permalink

New Moon July 2, 2008

10:19 pm EDT

7:19 pm PDT

11:32 Cancer Sun and Moon

The New Moon chart incorporates Venus and Mercury into the configuration of the slowly separating Finger of God. The Finger of God in June brought profound changes into our lives in June, particularly in our Leo house as it offered us an opportunity to release, release, release so we can move forward. (Or change, change, change so we move forward depending on how you look at what went on).

Under the New Moon, we look at, become conscious and see, using Mercury. Using hope, love and desire, we soften the experience using Venus. Be Gentle with yourself. Be kind to yourself. Know that once the changes happened, on some level, there is no going back. Your old life is over. Your new life will be beginning soon. Right now, we are in clean up, clean out mode.

Our New Moon is out of bounds, quite out, so emotions and feelings of release and new beginnings will be larger than they usually are on New Moons. Ceres is also out of bounds, in Cancer. Ceres straddles the Moon and Sun, with Venus on the other side. I envision the two of them, Ceres and Venus, holding hands around the front and back of the Sun and Moon. Remember when you were little and two adults did that to you? You had arms over your belly and arms behind your back. If you relaxed your stance and LET IT HAPPEN, the arms could and would sway you back and forth by pushing you gently. Try and relax into the energy of the New Moon like that. Let the Moon and Sun ease, let Ceres and Venus wrap you in their arms to push, pull, sway and gently move you to where they want you to go. They have an agenda to help you grow. Ceres nurtures. Venus desires. How can you nurture your desire under the New Moon. You can help them gently relax you into your new direction too.

Mars is on the fixed star Regulus. Regulus is the royal star and all about holding your head high and saying “I am! I am” It is about standing in your true essence and owning it. Now, Mars in Virgo is also critical, derisive, fussy and picky but he is doing it for your own good (or at least he thinks he is). If Mars gets a bit out of hand with the criticism, tell him to hush now and leave you alone. Then go back to swaying back and forth in Venus’ and Ceres’ arms. Mars is approaching a conjunction with Saturn so his focus is also on pushing Saturn to move his butt forward. Saturn is telling Mars, no, no, nope, not so fast. Let them have the conversation in the corner. In the meantime, while they are not looking, take a few teeny, tiny steps forward all by yourself. Remember Venus and Ceres are nurturing you to be your true self.

Mars and Saturn join up next week, starting a two year cycle about building structures (Saturn) to create and activate (Mars) your hopes and dreams. They last met up in June of 2006, which was the beginning of a cycle around your creativity and what you loved to do. Now they are in the sign of skill, precision, and the apprentice. Virgo is the craftsman or craftswoman ~ the skill with which you execute your life. Your skills about and around what you want and love to do, will solidify and increase over the next two years. Your skills around your purpose for incarnating will structure and develop. Look at the house that contains 5 Virgo to see the area of your life that is starting a new cycle.

The Finger of God, while a bit wider than in June, is still rolling along in the heavens. The Finger has been pointing at what you need to release to move forward. Mars is setting off the eclipse from February 20^th while the Node is on the eclipse degree from February 6^th. If you think back to what was going on then for you, the EMOTIONS from around that time are now clear, concise and much more accessible. You have a handle on them. Look at them. Give them over to the gentle rocking of Venus and Ceres. So, lets say you ran into “envy” on or around the eclipse and were very rattled by it. This New Moon helps you understand how your OLD issues from early in your life were activated by that eclipse. Now, right now, there is a time for healing. Let say you ran into “love” on or around the eclipse and were consumed by it. Now, this New Moon helps you understand how your OLD issues, from early in your life were activated and changed by the eclipse. If you look at the energy of last month, that Finger of God, well, you see the area that YOU hang onto in spite, perhaps, your best possibilities. Again, back to the gentle rocking of Ceres and Venus. What would you like to create instead?

Pluto is on the fixed start Acumen. My dictionary says acumen means “sharpness of mind: quick insight, or the ability to make quick accurate judgments of people or situations, political acumen. It comes from Latin , “point, sharpness,” formed from acuere “to sharpen.” Acumen is a star about being able to see too. Pluto is asking you to look and see what you see. Make a judgment about it. Let your quick insight see how the events of the last month or so conspired to help you get clear on what you see, what you saw and what you think about what you noticed. Just let it bubble up in your mind as Venus and Ceres sway you back and forth.

It also is a new moon taking place the day before Mercury leaves his shadow. Mercury has been in his shadow since May 10^th. So reach back a bit BEFORE the Finger of God, back into May to see what you see and how all the ghosts of the retrograde speak to the journey. The New Moon takes place on Mercury’s day (for all of us) and Mercury’s hour (for us East Coast folks). That adds even more punch to Mercury’s message. And remember, Mercury is in aspect, a sideways, light shining kind of aspect, to the Finger of God, asking all those planets involved, Jupiter about the abundance you‘d like, Uranus about the changes needed, Neptune about the dream of your heart, Chiron about the old wound to your soul and the Nodes about your choice(S) about what you want out of your life and how you want to proceed on the path before you. So sit and answer those various questions of your soul as Ceres and Venus rock you back and forth.

To further support you, there is a balance in the sky of the elements and modes ~ kind of like the Magician card in Tarot, all the things you need are before you waiting to be picked up and used to create the next chapter of your life. No shortages. Nothing missing. You have everything you need. Venus is minutes away in her approach to her opposition to Jupiter so she is pulling Jupiter’s creative energy into the gentle rocking motion she‘s doing with Ceres.

Be conscious of how the choices you’ve made up until this point in your life have created where you are now. No harsh criticisms. Just look. Observe. Your choices, made today, tomorrow, the next day and off into your future, create your future. As Ceres and Venus gently rock your soul back and forth, dream about what your best life would look like. See it evolve before your eyes. Imagine what it is. Harness the energy of the new moon to help make it a reality.

Lynda Hill’s interpretation of the Sabian Symbol for the New moon is A CHINESE WOMAN NURSING A BABY WHOSE AURA REVEALS HIM TO BE THE REINCARNATION OF A GREAT TEACHER

Commentary: The ‘Chinese Woman’ senses something ‘Great’ in the young ‘Baby’ she is ‘Nursing’. The fact that she is ‘Chinese’ is significant, as the ‘Chinese’ have had a long tradition of seeking the spiritual layers of life. The ‘Woman’ is sensing and seeing something in the young person that other nannies may not. She’s aware that the young person holds great talent and gifts for the future. His ‘Aura Reveals Him to be the Reincarnation of a Great Teacher’. Being able to see reverence in young people that appear to be “old” or “evolved” souls is an expression of a strong intuitive sensitivity. The ‘Woman’ sees that this child, this ‘Baby’, has a unique and special talent that can be of benefit to the world in some way. The ‘Child’ needs to be nurtured, nourished and cared for so he can reach his full potential.

Oracle: Messages of hope for the future are coming through younger and more vital elements. There may be an opportunity to learn important lessons from younger beings. The feeling that someone is an “old soul” can be felt but can be rather hard to explain; it seems to come with a special kind of “knowing”. While taking the time to try and make sense of it, the benefit or insight may be lost. The joy and power of young people, is fleeting and may require close attention to truly appreciate. This Symbol shows seeing the greatness in others, but this may be speaking about you, regardless of your age. Good nourishment and care increases everybody’s ability to make the most of the potential. Nurturing and caring for any small, but nonetheless significant, talents can allow things to blossom into something beyond present expectations.

Are you a ‘Great Teacher?’ Do you have largely untapped talents?

Keywords: Nurturing innocence and its rewards. Reincarnation and past lives. Charisma and presence. Channeling entities. Tibetan mysteries. Monks and the Dalai Lama. Ancient knowledge. Child prodigies. Seeing greatness ahead of its time. The Indigo children. Discovering latent talent. Visions. Holistic perceptions. Potential. Nurses. Nannies. Finding the one.

The Caution: Not seeing the beauty of youngsters. Being overcome with complexity. Demanding to be recognized. Not seeing the inherent greatness in simple things. Under or over estimating the potential of youth. Pushy and demanding young people.

Copyright © 2008 Anne Ortelee All Rights Reserved.

Lynda Hill’s interpretation of the Sabian Symbols appears with her permission. Check her work out at # http://www.sabiansymbols.typepad.com or # http://www.sabiansymbols.com

Posted by Anne Ortelee at 01:02 PM | Permalink