A curious story from an Aries Moon afternoon, three lunar cycles ago while the Sun was in Cancer…

​So I had already experienced a couple overindulgent months.  The last two signs of spring, in particular (Taurus and Gemini o’course).  Personal Pluto-Moon transits are rough… I treated myself accordingly.  Still got it in, still got things done, just felt low anyway.  Like good work, good love, but like still crawling out from the bottom of a bottle.

On this particular afternoon, I was headed to the gym to meet up with my vegan bodybuilder friend Chris.  He also happens to be a death metal vocalist and local standup comic.  Pretty iconoclastic dude, right.

​Having turned in my last car lease, I opted for the (so I think) lesser-of-the-evils Lyft and caught a ride to Exercise Warehouse in Bloomfield.  There was a time when I was the second most frequent Lyft user in the city of Pittsburgh (long underworldly story), so when it comes to rideshare you know that’s a preference.

Exercise Warehouse really is every bit a gym belonging in Bloomfield, ‘Pittsburgh’s Little Italy.’  You’d have to step in and walk around for that to make sense, but the area at the top of the stairs to the second floor is decorated with a diverse array of old photographs and plaques emanating that kind of charm.  Black and white pictures of old members and historic athletes, boxers, and so on.  The upstairs just feels like there used to be a small boxing ring in it (I was right), and the equipment throughout the whole building is all old school gym wares.

Those familiar with the language know Aries to be a warrior type sign, first sign of the zodiac and natural year, the instigation of Spring, cardinal fire, the spirit’s dominion over the child as it fearlessly does shit without any notion of limitation.  Cancer, where the Sun was, has strong association with family, home, territory, ‘tribe’, and what makes a person feel inwardly comforted.

​The driver taking me from the South Side Slopes to this gym in Bloomfield was a rather stoic guy, a boxer, 6’ 8” and currently about 250 lbs.  We started shooting the shit, and he said there’s a picture of him among the plaques at the top of the gym’s stairs, moments after being knocked out in a match by the owner’s nephew, also in the photo. It came off humble of him to mention it, no less because he seemed particularly unphased. (Born in ’84, so that Jupiter-in-Capricorn type realism.)  Said something like, ‘We were friends even before and didn’t want to fight each other. He nearly knocked me out of my shoes. But it’s all good ‘cause I knocked him out the second time we fought.’  He doesn’t belong to that gym, just happened to scoop me up.

While synchronicities like this happen every day, and by perceiving them we attract them as our bread and butter (because that’s how it works), this little story stood out as an example of that day’s Cancer Sun / Aries Moon square.  The nature of Aries, the warrior, the fighter, and Cancer, the home turf (it was the gym owner’s nephew who won the fight, after all), were perfect in portraying this.

I found the driver dude’s word choice — ‘almost knocked me out of my shoes’ — amusing because his last name is Shook, a variant of the German ‘Schuck’ coming from ‘scouh’ — which means ‘shoemaker.'

Both he and his boxer buddy share the same first name. It comes from the Hebrew ‘Mikha'el’, which means the rhetorical “who is like God?"

These synchronicities — who happened to pick me up, his relationship to the gym, and word choice given his last name — popped off in my head as a quick reminder to walk in humility and check excessive ego at the door. 🐑

Presently, the waning Aries Moon has passed its fullness across the loop from the Sun in Libra.  The Sun is making a square to Saturn, and in this engagement boundaries are being better established as relationships (Libra) go.  The summer’s Mars retrograde in Aquarius may have felt unmotivated or aggressive/regressive, but it’s likely that it also helped us gain some distance and objectivity on relational matters.  New and past partners have likely darted into conversation with us, particular past partners over the course of the summer.  While Mars has been direct for a few weeks now, this Full Moon capitalizes on some of the same themes.

Let us walk in humility, and cull back the pride and volatility that can so damage our relationships.  Swim well, stargazers~