Astrology: Aquarius plus Mercury Retrograde

First, let me apologize to my Sagittarius and Capricorn friends for neglecting them these last two months. Since my back problems started in September, my blog posts have dwindled to about three per month. I'm in physical therapy now and slowly getting better, but I'm still not supposed to sit for more than twenty minutes at a time, which makes it a little hard to focus on much of anything. I'll try to do better in the blogging department, but with no guarantees.

January 20 saw the sun move into Aquarius as well as the inauguration of the 44th President of the United States: Barack Hussein Obama. An auspicious occasion for all, but not without its glitches. Even the president can't avoid the consequences of Mercury Retrograde as we saw when the oath was taken late (after 12 Noon) and the words were garbled. Liz Rose wrote a good post about this at Huffington Post entitled Even Obama Must Contend With Mercury Retrograde. She concludes that this is a "a poor time to communicate and make initial decisions but a great time to review, reconsider and redo." Mercury goes direct on Feb. 8. Personally, I can't wait.

Now back to Aquarius, the eleventh sign of the Zodiac, and one of only two symbolized by a human: the water bearer. A masculine, fixed, air sign, Aquarius was originally thought to be ruled by Saturn (along with the sign Capricorn) but modern astrologers assign it to Uranus, and I think it's a good fit. The dual rulership means that Aquarians can be very forward thinking, even visionary (Uranus plus air sign), but may yet be rigid in their opinions (Saturn plus fixed sign). That doesn't mean we'll find balance here. Some Aquarians are reformers who change the status quo (Abraham Lincoln, for instance) while others, like Ronald Reagan, are unabashed conservatives. Uranus is given to extremes and the same can be true of Aquarius. The Saturn Uranus combination doesn't necessarily make for an easy partnership.

Aquarians are caught between innovation and practicality. How this works out in the individual is represented by other aspects in the chart. For instance, Mercury in Capricorn or strong aspects from Saturn can keep the Aquarian down to earth while Mercury in Pisces or strong aspects from Neptune can send him soaring to the stars. Linda Goodman describes the typical Aquarian as "half Albert Schweitzer, half Mickey Mouse".

In any case, being a fixed air sign means Aquarians can be quite fixed in their ideas and impatient with others who disagree or fail to follow their rapid thought processes. They can also be quite outspoken. My husband's favorite mantra is "I never apologize for speaking the truth". Of course, that's the truth as he sees it. :)

For more information on Aquarius, go to http://www.astrology.com/allaboutyou/sunsigns/aquarius.html

Is there an Aquarian in your life?

Linda