A Day in the Life of a Bad Cancerian

I lost the plot yesterday.

To those who know me well, perhaps this comes as a complete surprise as I'm so normally so calm, cool and collected.

OK, you can stop the giggling and listen to this little astrological tale.

For the past year or so, Jupiter has been my friend, my pal, my bosom buddy. Lately this friend has been totally broadsided by Pluto--you know, God of the Underworld. To make matters worse, my other buddy Mercury has been stationing on Pluto. 

Before we go any further, I just need to point out I really dislike it when people start blaming retrograde Mercury for everything from lost post to internet disruption to getting lost on the way to a party: Mercury doesn't cause that--people who aren't paying attention do. It's become an excuse: "oh I got stuck in traffic and it's all because Mercury is retrograde" as if traffic jams, delayed messages and dodgy internet connections never happen when Mercury is in forward motion. It's just ridiculous. Throw some empirical evidence in and the data nerd might pay attention.

Anyway, this story is different because Mercury was stationing (getting ready to change to forward direction again) on Pluto with a personal connection to my natal Jupiter.

So this past week, I've travelled across a continent (a big one at that) to be at a conference in India. I've have spent the past week pretty much under hot lights, getting my photo taken, getting bossed around, eating on schedule and getting lost in a 5 star hotel. Things are a little different to the way I like them to be, i.e. drinking tea all morning while I write, eating when I feel like and admiring sunsets.

Yesterday I just could not cope anymore. I was physically exhausted and rendered mentally incompetent. Decision making? Forget it! To top it all off, I had a splitting headache (I cannot even remember the last time I had a headache). In other words, I felt like shit. Really.

What had happened was I had booked some hotels to go to after the conference. These were online bookings with booking.com which has never let me down. Ever. But this is India. There are so many addresses no one knows where anything is. And I've been so busy with the conference I hadn't been able to sort out a sim card. I really didn't even know what that meant or why it was so important: until I needed to book a flight to Varanasi. Despite my best efforts, I just couldn't book a flight and suddenly felt very alone and helpless on this great big heaving continent full of people, horns, pollution and different languages. I also ended up losing--and paying for--my hotel bookings.

So I had a meltdown.

Nothing made sense to me anymore. Nothing! It took 3 people to talk me down (thank you Victor, Gopal and Julian) plus Michelle, Richard and Nick to assure me they had my back. I was totally ready to head back to the UK and get back to teaching until I was old enough to retire. My cats! My duvet! Yah, that's how freaked out I was. Get me back to where everything is familiar.

It was at that point I realised that perhaps I'm not such a bad Cancerian after all. All my life, I have denied being a Cancerian because I'm not even a little home-loving and shy. Or so I thought. Put me under (a lot) of stress and I just want my mommy (OK things never got that bad).

So these are a few things I learned about myself when I experience extreme conditions:

1. I hate packing
2. My hearing goes funny when I'm stressed
3. My decision making process, dodgy at the best of times, goes tits up
4. I have some damn good friends.
5. I really need to remember all this

First the Ocean, Now the Sky

I've woken up this morning with the distinct feeling that the universe cracked while I was sleeping. And maybe it did. Yesterday the Moon-Venus opposition was on my nodal axis and the midpoint of transiting Mercury and Pluto were on my natal Jupiter.

I knew something profound was about to happen yesterday at 1:22pm (astrologers always take note of these things). I had been contemplating going to the beach but I had this uneasiness about what the ocean had to say. It wasn't a fear, it was just an uncertainty about how much change one person can tolerate in such a short space of time.

As I was thinking this, a small feather floated from the sky--and I kid you not--landed near my feet. My first thought was of my grandmother. So I picked up the feather and thanked my ancestors. Like a good Ojibwa. And then I was overcome with such intense homesickness--the first bout I've had since being away for so long--that tears sprang to my eyes.

Home. Where is that, I wondered.

I'm such a bad Cancerian (or so I thought) that I couldn't even answer that question. I've been wrestling with a certain terror that I've managed to scatter the people I love all over the globe and the only way I can communicate with them is via Facebook. I felt ashamed. What the hell am I doing? I need to go home.

And then the sky spoke. This feather, this feather that floated from the sky from the wing of some unseen  bird, reminded me that I am home. This is it. Home. I am home. Wherever I lay my hat.

A few hours later and I'm on the beach with two South African Sangomas watching the first sunset of the Summer Solstice. One of the sangomas had not worn shoes in over 20 years and he made me wonder what it would be like to feel the earth under one's feet for so long without the barrier of shoes. He also had long, uncut hair. I asked him if it was in his tradition to cut hair in grief as it for the Ojibwas. My own hair was pretty much down to my waist when I lost relatives and cut my hair very short. I wore my grief and was reminded of it every time I went to pull my non existent hair from my collar. My hair is just starting to grow back but I still remember my grief when I look in the mirror. The sangoma told me that he last shaved his head when his father died. Then we both laughed at our good fortune to have growing hair. How fleeting life is and how long is the recovery from grief. But now we can laugh because we understand what it means to regrow from loss. 

The sangomas had brought me to a place to watch the sunset. It felt like the edge of the world. Behind us were "The Twelve Apostles" hills and before us was the ocean. There was a very light mist as the light of the dying sun turned the atmosphere to lavender. When it was getting dark, I took my shoes off so I could feel the rocks beneath my feet.

And I knew I was home.

And I also knew that wherever life takes me I am home. Here. Now. I am safe, balanced and far heartier than I had thought.

And the other thing I know is that I too am a sangoma. It might be known by a different name in different languages but by the Great Goddess, I now know I am--and have always been--a sangoma. I had just forgotten.

And it's great to be home.

I know this because a seemingly insignificant feather floated down from the sky and landed at my feet.