TRANSITING SATURN SQUARE MARS
Saturn, Rings and Two Moons by NASA
I'm beginning to take transits seriously again. I drifted away due to their complete inability to predict events, but not quite. They don't predict big events -- the disasters or victories. But they do predict how you will feel at any given time and how people may be treating you.
If you have your natal Mars in mid-degrees of Cancer or Capricorn, you have transiting Saturn square natal Mars -- like I have. And you also had it around, mainly before, Thanksgiving of last year.
The Robert Hand definition of this is "ego conflicts" and that's exactly what happened. I dumped three friends because of it. What's interesting is that I had absolutely no problem with some people and others? It got ugly. I can honestly say that I initiated none of it. But I reacted to it very strongly. So I'm wondering if that's part of the definition -- that if someone is looking for a fight and you have transiting Saturn square Mars, they find you.
One friend was behaving badly and trying to control Thanksgiving -- so much so her sister-in-law cancelled altogether. I went to another friend's. And since then, due in part to this behavior, I've moved on. Another person sent me an example of her writing, and it just pissed me off, because she wasn't using periods -- just commas. I thought at the time I was overreacting, but it was how I felt. It felt like she was disrespecting me. And I even wrote a blog on it in "Just Because." That's the strength of my reaction. And later, possbily, because of this incident, it got really nasty. I know that she had progressed Sun conjunct Mars. So she was confrontational. But she was also possibly my biggest Xtrology fan. What a shame if I allowed an aspect (I'm an astrologer. I should know better) influence my behavior in a negative way (but remember the definition, ego!)? It's not like I never make a typo. And a third friend sent me a hateful e-mail about something personal to me, and I just let it rip. E-mailed her back and put the remainder of her e-mails in a folder -- where they are today -- unread. It did serve the purpose of me warning her about a negative progression which I would not have done otherwise. I'm not completely losing it, I did get that could be the reason for the incident. But so unpleasant!
But yet another incident had a good ending. The building between my apartment and Hollywood Boulevard has, since their inception a couple of years ago, been noisy very early in the morning. This time men were throwing boxes off the roof at 5:00 am. And I just lost it. They also regularly had their trash pickup before 8:00 am and metal-against-metal -- really loud. So I called my city counselman, Tom LaBonge, thank you very much, and they negotiated with the building to stop that nonsense. And they have. Previously I didn't have the energy to confront this situation, but during that astrology transit, I did.
Yesterday I had the most negative day. No one was nice to me. So I decided to check my transits knowing that I am finally completely free of negative progressions. And there it was: Saturn square Mars. If you are having this aspect in your chart (Astrotheme.com will do them for you), my recommendation is to lay low for awhile. Mostly you will not win the argument, and you'll eventually run out of friends you can dump.
The bad news? Saturn is retrograding now (this is why retrogrades are important) to 10 degrees, and then it will go forward and cross my 12 degree Mars until around September. If your Mars is Capricorn or Cancer and your degrees are earlier, you had it earlier. If your Mars is Capricorn or Cancer and you are at later degrees, you will have it later. And you guys will generally miss the stationing (stopping) of Mars at 10 degrees so it won't last as long. However, you may still feel the same effects.
And it could be your Venus in those signs, "break up." Or your Mercury, "difficulties in communicating with others." Or the Moon, "lonely and isolated." Or your Sun, "discouraged."