Saturn's a returnin'

Today is my 28 and a half birthday. According to what I have learned about astrology, Saturn makes it first triumphant return on this very day. Saturn has been described to me as the ass kicking planet. It represents restrictions, limitations, and hard learned lessons. From what I understand the change and growth that comes from Saturn is permanent and life changing. A person's Saturn return is the time period when Saturn returns to the exact place in the sky as when you were born. Saturn takes 28.5 years to make its trip around and return to that exact position and the affects of a Saturn return can be felt the years surrounding this point. So here I am face to face with the restrictions and constrictions of Ms. Saturn. My Saturn is in Virgo so my lessons are supposed to come in the form of work, service, organization, and health. I can feel it too, the rightness of my career choice and the foreverness of the idea of a career. I am so used to things having a clear end in sight. But with a career you like in an area you also like, it gets daunting. There is no end. This just may keep going on and on with my annual 2 weeks off. I'm guessing my lesson in all this is to find my peace with that or to find a way to live that balances out all my needs. I'm hoping going through this process will magically make me an organized person as well. I think in a very organized manner but that skill somehow never leaked out of my brain and into my clutter. Health wise I have been making an effort to stick with a swimming routine (2.5 months and still going!) as well as making some smart choices around not eating gluten or too much sugar (they just ruin me). I guess I see this day as a turning point. If a person is supposed to feel the affects of Saturn's return the year or so before and after 28.5 years, I guess I'm half way though. No where to go but up.

When Death Comes

On the theme of Stargirl, this poem captures some of that same feeling. It's a favorite of mine.

When Death Comes
by Mary Oliver

When death comes like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse
to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes like the measles-pox;
when death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,
I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?
And therefore I look upon everything as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,and I consider eternity as another possibility,
and I think of each life as a flower, as common as a field daisy, and as singular,
and each name a comfortable music in the mouth tending as all music does, toward silence,
and each body a lion of courage, and something precious to the earth.
When it's over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.
When it is over, I don't want to wonder if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,or full of argument.
I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

Stargirl Magic

I just finished the second book by Jerry Spinelli about Miss Stargirl Caraway entitled "Love, Stargirl" and though it is not as fabulous as the original, at the moment I am reveling in the magic that is Stargirl. The first book is told from the perspective of an 11th grade boy living in Arizona. Stargirl, who had been home schooled up until now, starts 10th grade at his school and everyone notices. She is unlike any other girl he has ever met. She wears costumes that her mother has made, she carries a ukulele and plays for everyone at lunch time, she has a pet rat she always keeps with her, she creates her own name according to how she is feeling about herself at a particular stage in her life (her birth name is Susan), she really sees people, she performs kind acts for those all around her, and she knows who she is and cares very little for fitting in or being "cool".

Through the first book you see how a force like that interacts with a very typical high school. Do they shun her or follow her? Her sureness about herself makes her both extremely attractive and terribly scary to most of the students at the high school. The second book is told from Stargirl's perspective and though it takes away from her magic (a little), it lets us see more of her. She learns the very important lesson of being in the moment so as to fully live her life. She shows us the value of connecting on a deep level with nature and all the people around us. She shows us that everyone has something beautiful and wonderful to offer the world if we just take the time to get to know them.

I see her as a wonderful role model for all of us, at any age. It takes an extraordinary strength to really be ourselves in this world, at times. Its easy to get so wrapped up in our lives that we miss the beauty of the world around us and the magic that each moment can hold. Even though it's a young adult book I would recommend Stargirl to everyone.

The birth of a blog

I have been thinking about starting one of these blog things for awhile. While procrastinating this week one has finally materialized. I am not sure what exactly will befall these pages, but perhaps it will get me writing, something I want to spend more time doing. I hope it will also serve as a way to share some wonderful things I have discovered along my journey. Spring seems to be the perfect time for something like this to begin. I have always felt that spring serves as a better time for beginnings and change than New Years. Some of my current changes include writing again, swimming again, and exploring myself in various forms of relationship with people. Beltane has come, spring is in full bloom, let us all follow the lead of nature and explore those parts of ourselves that are growing, changing, and blooming.