A touching story about the once-split now reconciled marriage of Pam Shriver, former tennis pro, and actor George Lazenby. What brought them back together after a bitter split was his advancing dementia (and their three children). She said they had a turbulent relationship: sometimes tender, sometimes toxic. “There were times, after our divorce, when we could not bear speaking to each other.” He is in an assisted living facility but she says they have rediscovered the mutual admiration that originally drew them together and talk every day. He has become a softer version of himself and has mellowed. “There was a moment, earlier this year, when he was caught up in the Los Angeles wildfires and only made it out by a whisker. That day, I realised how much he still means to me.”
She was born 4 July 1962 in Baltimore, Maryland; he on 5 September 1939 in New South Wales, Australia.
She is a Sun Cancer in a Water Grand Trine to Jupiter in Pisces trine Neptune in Scorpio, formed into a Kite by a super-confident Jupiter opposition Pluto. She also has Uranus conjunct Alphard square a Taurus Mars and Algol – so a strong minded personality.
While he has an Earth Grand Trine of Mars in Capricorn trine Uranus (Moon) in Taurus trine Neptune in Virgo – and a Virgo Sun Venus, with Saturn in Taurus conjunct his South Node square Pluto. She described him as super-critical which will be his Virgo Sun but his heavily aspected Pluto and hair-trigger Mars trine Uranus would not help.
A Water Earth combo is in itself helpful though he lacks Water altogether so would have problems empathizing with her point of view. Her Mars square Uranus also collided with his Uranus Moon square Mercury for running flare-ups.
Their relationship chart has a truly difficult composite Saturn, Jupiter, Mars conjunction trine Mercury and inconjunct Pluto – and reports at the time of the divorce suggest each gave as good as they got.
When they split in 2008 in the run up the tr Pluto in late Sagittarius square tr Uranus in late Pisces were both bearing down on their composite Saturn, Jupiter, Mars which would put their relationship under intolerable pressure.
What I had never realized was that after his Bond movie he turned down a contract to do six more. He was on his Saturn Return then and found the pressure of the movie overwhelming. His decision did considerable damage to his later career.
For good or for ill Donald Trump’s bond with the USA is a close one, not easily pulled apart. But all political careers end in failure runs the saying. He too will pass one way or another though it is difficult to predict when his time at the top will give way to the ravages of time and fate.
There is a composite Sun trine Pluto sextile Saturn in his relationship chart with the USA which is chained together. Although tr Saturn Neptune in Aries will make a concerted effort in 2026 (and 2027) to undermine solidarity and support; with a jolting, tension-erupting tr Uranus square the composite Saturn in 2026/27 and tr Pluto square the Pluto in 2025/6 – so there will be heavy pressures and strong headwinds which will make even the most faithful of fans wilt.
Looking across the country relationship charts of other politicians who eventually gave into gravity – Tony Blair, Margaret Thatcher, General Franco, Richard Nixon, Pinochet, Videla of Argentina – there was a mix of Uranus influences (= freedom) and South Node aspects when they departed. Apart from tr Uranus rattling up the composite Saturn for Trump in 2026/27, what is notable is that the Lunar Eclipse of autumn 2028 will catch Trump’s composite South Node with the USA which may well be significant.
The key aspects affecting the USA national chart ahead.
Tr Neptune will square the USA financial Venus from this month onwards joined in 2026 by tr Saturn – which suggests a downbeat mood on the money front. Tr Saturn in 2026 will also dent confidence in square to the USA Jupiter, joined in 2027/28 by the bubble bursting tr Neptune square Jupiter which will undermine unrealistic optimism. By 2031/32 tr Neptune will square the USA Cancer Sun for a slipping, sliding, indecisive and not confident phase.
The history-changing collision between the USA Cancer Sun square Saturn in Libra in its Solar Arc positions and the USA Mars in Gemini square Neptune in Virgo picked up last year and will run on into early 2027. After which the setbacks and anxieties thrown up by it should fade.
However the USA Saturn in Libra and Cancer Sun will remain under pressure for some years. A stuck Solar Arc Pluto will square the Sun in 2033 and bring hardship in conjunction to the USA Saturn in 2034. With major setbacks from the Progressed Mars conjunct the USA Saturn in 2032. Which could be a future government trying to pick up the pieces of previous bad government, financial and judicial, or it could be external events.
And the next two elections in the 2030s will be contending with Solar Arc Saturn conjunct the USA Venus and Jupiter which will be downbeat – or at least forcing a few realities into the foreground.
As to similarities to the Mcarthy era: From an old post. There certainly were when Trump was first elected in 2016 when tr Uranus was impacting the USA’s obsessive, paranoid and hostile Mercury opposition Pluto – but the mood lingers on with the Solar Arc Mercury opposition Solar Arc Pluto catching the changing of the celestial guard with tr Saturn Neptune in hard aspect and tr Uranus and tr Pluto in sextile/trine for several years ahead.
2016 post:
“Remember it was White Americans who put you in the presidency, not radical leftists,” tweeted former KKK leader David Duke in response to Donald Trump’s half-hearted attempt to blame both sides for the white supremacist violence against peaceful protesters in Charlottesville. And the Washington Post is now directly comparing Trump’s modus operandi to Joseph McCarthy (URL below).
Both of which lock in to the key astrological transit on the USA chart from 2016 to early 2018. Transiting Uranus is squaring the USA Mercury in Cancer opposition Pluto, as it was in 1953/54 when McCarthy, having lied, smeared and ramped up hatred through his anti-Communist hearings, was finally tumbled. When he finally crashed and burned tr Uranus was exactly square the US Pluto.
Mercury opposition Pluto does exacerbate suspicion, paranoia, is associated with demagogues and those guilty of fraudulent misrepresentation, promotes over-intense debates with a drive for domination and little latitude for compromise, can teeter on the brink of nervous collapse through strain. Uranus is on an 84-year cycle of transits, so hard aspects come round every 21 years.
Trump, of course, learnt his McCarthy playbook from his mentor Roy Cohn (See post: March 7 2017). At the time, former president Harry Truman lamented “the rise to power of the demagogue who lives on untruth; it is the spread of fear and the destruction of faith in every level of our society.” A Post reporter Murray Marder described “a period of national turmoil. It was the closest we ever came to a real totalitarian atmosphere.” It wasn’t the media who brought McCarthy down since they’d been exposing his lies in the preceding years. In rural and low-income areas, he was deemed to have been unfairly vilified and gained support. Ultimately it was when the politicians turned against him and there was sufficient of an upswell of public opinion that his platform was demolished.
During another tr Uranus square the US Mercury opposition Pluto in 1973/4, Watergate was raging, escalating and ended with Richard Nixon’s resignation to avoid impeachment charges, as tr Uranus squared the US Mercury for the final time. VP Spiro Agnew had previously resigned faced with tax evasion charges.
Nixon died under the next tr Uranus hard aspect to the US Pluto opposition Mercury in 1994, then in Capricorn conjunct Neptune, so a very high-tension mood, as the Whitewater Investigation into Clinton financial dealings got underway, which although it fizzled out, did prepare the ground for the later impeachment of Bill Clinton over the Lewinsky affair. Jackie Kennedy also died, Superman Chris Reeves was paralysed, the Oklahoma bombing killed 169; and Newt Gingrich as Republican leader took over both houses, under a Democrat president.
Oct 1973 to Oct 1974 – VP Spiro Agnew resigns faced with tax evasion charges. Watergate is raging, escalating and ends with Nixon’s resignation to avoid impeachment charges, as tr Uranus squares the US Mercury for the final time in August 1974, tugging on the US Pluto.
On a previous occasion – April 1933 to April 1933 – President Franklin D Roosevelt declares a national emergency to come off the Gold Standard; and the Business Plot was uncovered which was an attempted coup d’etat against the government and Roosevelt’s progressive policies, by a group of fascist veterans and wealthy businessmen, wanting to ally themselves to Hitler’s Germany and Italy. At the time it was written off as a hoax but there did seem to be some wild scheme in place.
So this influence definitely attacks both the government and US democracy, either by dragging scandals into the open or letting loose hard right-wing fanatics.
So it has always been a significant and risky time in the US for presidents and the national morale, with the Republicans centre-stage. Back it comes round again and Trump is under multiple investigations which could lead to Federal indictments or impeachment ultimately; and the US is seeing an upsurge in far-right vitriol.
Christian Horner has been dropped by Red Bull as CEO a year after allegations surfaced of him sending texts to a female member of staff of which he was cleared at the time. But patience at the top has finally snapped. A sports reporter wrote: “While he has achieved success and clearly has many qualities, I am not sure there has been a leader in any sport who has alienated so many people, both within the ecosystem and beyond it.” Any time in the past he has been criticised even with good cause he has lashed back or played the victim however ludicrous his claims.
Born 16 November 1973, he has a Scorpio Sun and Mercury with a confident, super-ambitious Pluto trine Jupiter in Aquarius, sextile Neptune. What probably causes the lash backs are two aspects. One is an explosive Mars in Aries opposition Uranus making him short-fused, uncompromising and drawn to a high-adrenaline sport. Added to that (and a Scorpio Sun Mercury) is a focal point Pluto square Saturn opposition Venus. Such a Pluto never lets go, has a chip on the shoulder, can be resentful and contemptuous, confrontational and tends to attract resistance.
Oddly enough Geri Halliwell, 6 August 1972 2.30pm Watford, a Sun, Mercury, Mars (and Alphard) in Leo also has Pluto on the focal point of a T square to Venus opposition Jupiter. But she’s obvious learned to suppress her need to control.
Their relationship chart has a composite controlling Sun Pluto conjunction with a Mars Saturn conjunction which usually suggests a fractious relationship where one partner has to bite their tongue and suppress their identity to keep it together.
Their togetherness looks to be rattled by arguments late this October to the end of the year and undermined through 2026/27 – first by tr Saturn square the Mars Saturn and then tr Neptune Saturn opposing the composite Sun Pluto. I would be surprised if that held together.
The Texas flash floods in the early hours of the 4th July have claimed over a hundred dead, including a number of children at summer camp, with more than 160 people still missing and numbers rising.
The previous Lunar Eclipse of March set for Texas has Neptune and (shipwrecking) Scheat on the IC with Moon close to the Midheaven, all of which make sense of a devastating watery disaster close to home. With a regretful Sun Saturn in Pisces trine an 8th house Mars. [Houses are not supposed to matter for eclipses but my experience is the 8th house often crops up for disasters.]
The upcoming September Lunar Eclipse set for Texas has the Sun Mercury close to the Midheaven with Moon on the IC and an exact Uranus on the Descendant – with hard questions being asked in the aftermath about whether cuts to government agencies had led to damaging delays in alerting residents.
The flood happened with the two aggravated Pluto and Mars yods still in place; and Venus Uranus conjunct the destructive Fixed star Algol as well.
Zionism was the dream of Hungarian journalist Theodor Herzl who believed antisemitism could not be defeated or cured, only avoided, and that the only way to avoid it was the establishment of a Jewish state. He argued that the Jewish people should leave Europe for Palestine, their historic homeland. They possessed a nationality; all they were missing was a nation and a state of their own. His ideas ran into opposition from members of the Orthodox community and those seeking to integrate in non-Jewish society. Earlier ideas for a homeland included South America and Africa.
His public utterances tended to give the impression that the non-Jewish residents of a future Jewish state would be well treated as he tried to win international support for his idea. But in his diary he wrote: “We must expropriate gently the private property on the estates assigned to us. We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it employment in our own country. Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.’
Which is not far removed from the present defence minister, Israel Katz’s stated plans for a “humanitarian city” into which Palestinians in Gaza would be forced. Prof Amos Goldberg, a historian of the Holocaust, described it as “a concentration camp or a transit camp for Palestinians before they expel them”. The “emigration plan” which Mr Katz says “will happen”, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, is in fact an ethnic cleansing plan. No departure can be considered voluntary when the alternative is starvation or indefinite imprisonment in inhuman conditions.
The World Zionist Organization was founded at the congress on 29 August 1897 in Basel, Switzerland and is its legislative authority. Its stated aim:- “Strengthening Israel as a Jewish, Zionist and democratic state and shaping it as an exemplary society with a unique moral and spiritual character, marked by mutual respect for the multi-faceted Jewish people, rooted in the vision of the prophets, striving for peace and contributing to the betterment of the world.”
In more recent times, the ultra-nationalist Religious Zionist Party was formed with Bezazel Smotrich, the far-right settler leader at its head, and is driven by notions of Jewish supremacy and anti-Arab racism.
Theodor Herzl, 2 May 1860 1.30 am Budapest, Hungary, had an intense, determined Sun Pluto in Leo in his communicative 3rd house widely square Saturn in wannabe-important Leo in his 7th. He had an enthusiastic and motivating Jupiter in Cancer opposition Mars square Mercury; and a dreamer’s Neptune in Pisces opposition Moon square Venus in his 5th.
With his North Node on his Aquarius Ascendant and Chiron in his 1st house he would be lacking in self-esteem and obsessed with his image.
“He imagined himself as a great statesman creating a dynasty for his family in Palestine once a Jewish state was established, where his father would be its foundational senator, and his son a doge.”
In the event he died young at 44, followed soon after by his wife, to whom it was reported he had given gonorrhea. His three children led troubled lives, one dying of a heroin overdose, one of suicide and one in a concentration camp during WW11.
When Israel was founded four decades after his death his ‘ghost’ chart recorded a Saturn Return; with tr Uranus triggering his dreamers’ Neptunian T square in its Solar Arc Positions. His Solar Arc Sun was conjunct his South Node (exactly) which may have been a hint that his ego and vanity (SN in Leo) had won out over his humanitarian Aquarius North Node.
The Zionist Congress 29 August 1897 in Basel, Switzerland, had a Virgo Sun square Pluto in Gemini and Jupiter in Virgo square Neptune – so was born out of the Neptune Pluto conjunction in Gemini of the time which produced visionary, religious and ambitious plans. Neptune and Pluto together create a fey, mystical mix of energies, both wonderful and terrifying at the same time. Neptune in its visionary aspect, mixing with Pluto’s power drive, creates a delusional though often devastatingly effective megalomania.
There was also a can-be-autocratic Uranus Saturn in Scorpio which was inconjunct Neptune. With a devoted-to-a-cause Aquarius North Node.
When Israel was founded in 1948 the Zionist Solar Arc Pluto as well as the transiting Pluto were conjunct its South Node in Leo – again promoting ego and selfish glory over humanitarianism.
Much water flowed under the bridge after Herzl’s death with the 1917 Balfour Declaration agreeing to a Jewish homeland in Palestine though stipulating the rights of the indigenous population should not be affected; the rise of fascism and anti-semitism in Europe; increasing unrest in Palestine with an influx of Jewish immigrants and the rise of Jewish militant groups, the Arab-Jewish War of the mid 1930s, the Holocaust and on.
There’s nothing new to say that has not been said here before with little indication of peace in Israel as tr Pluto in Aquarius makes its inexorable progress in opposition to the Israel Moon in 2026/27 – and through the 2030s opposing the 10th house Saturn Pluto and eventually square the Israel Sun and opposition Mars before it exits in the early 2040s. That looks like an unending, recycling two decades of extreme pressure and jeopardy.
Repeating a thought from a previous post:
Savage ironies are writ large in the intractable, never-ending Dante’s Inferno of the Israel/Palestine saga. The Jewish people never forgot the homeland they had been ejected from two millenia ago and yet the Israelis set their faces obdurately against any suggestion that the 700,000 indigenous Palestinians who were forcibly severed from their homes after the creation of Israel should be allowed to return. The 1948 order to expel an entire population “without attention to age” was signed by Yitzhak Rabin, a future prime minister. The lone voice of an opposition politician Meir Ya’ari spoke out against it. He noted “how easily” Israel’s leaders spoke of how it was “possible and permissible to take women, children and old men and to fill the road with them because such is the imperative of strategy. And this we say . . . who remember who used this means against our people during the [Second World] War . . . I am appalled.”
Richard Burton regarded as one of the finest actors of his generation was born 100 years ago. His memorable performance as Hamlet in 1964 cemented his promise as “the natural successor to Olivier”. His failure to live up to those expectations disappointed many with his heavy drinking and much-publicised turbulent relationship with Liz Taylor leading to regret about a great performer who had wasted his talent.
In his middle years he was smoking 100 cigarettes a day and drinking three to four bottles of hard liquor a day as well. He said that he turned to the bottle for solace “to burn up the flatness, the stale, empty, dull deadness that one feels when one goes offstage”. His unhealthy lifestyle led in his forties to cirrhosis of the liver and kidney disease. He died at 58.
He was born 10 November 1925 3pm Neath, Wales, the twelfth of thirteen children with a coal miner father who was also a heavy drinker and gambler, and a barmaid mother who died when he was two years old. Richard was subsequently brought up by his elder sister. He was the first member of his family to go to secondary school and had an excellent speaking and singing voice, with an interest in poetry as well as English and Welsh literature. A school master Philip Burton took him under his wing and nurtured his singing and acting talent.
He had a depressive and intense 8th house exact Sun Saturn conjunction in a creative Water Grand Trine to a 12th house Uranus in Pisces trine Pluto in Cancer in his 4th, with his Pluto opposition Jupiter in Capricorn – a mix of emotional overload, self-doubt and supreme confidence. His charming Venus in Capricorn was in his career 10th trine a Virgo Moon which sat with his Neptune in Leo in his 6th house of health. A 6th house Moon can connect emotional state to physical wellbeing – and a 6th house Neptune needs to treat health with kindness, abuse of any kind has a damaging impact.
He also had a wide yod of Mars in his 7th sextile Neptune inconjunct his Uranus.
A talented and tormented man.
His relationship with his schoolmaster Philip Burton, 30 November 1904, was the pivotal one in his life with Philip Burton’s Uranus falling on his pupil’s Midheaven and his Pluto square Richard Burton’s Uranus and his Jupiter in RB’s 1st – a catalyst who bolstered the youngster’s confidence and sent his life on a different track.
Burton’s relationship with Liz Taylor was hardly well-starred with her Scorpio Moon conjunct his 8th house Sun Saturn and his Virgo Moon conjunct her Neptune and opposition her Sun, Mercury, Mars in Pisces.
Their relationship chart had a controlling/possessive composite Sun Mercury opposition Pluto which did not sit well with her need-for-constant-change Venus Uranus conjunction in Aries or his troubled-loner temperament. It also had a cruel-treatment, short-fused Mars Saturn conjunction. Couldn’t live with each other or without. Two marriages, two divorces.
I’m not altogether convinced about her 2.30am birth time 27 February 1932 London (it is marked as birth certificate except England did not normally record birth times). It explains certain things with a powerfully influential 8th house Pluto in a disruptive square to Venus Uranus in Aries in her 4th pointing to a constantly changing domestic life. But it says little about the health problems which plagued her life. She was a Sun Mars Mercury in Pisces opposition Neptune so well suited to the film business. And her Jupiter in flashy Leo clearly appreciated the high-life.
Add On: One week before he died at 59, Richard Burton poured his heart onto paper for Elizabeth Taylor—just eight months after he’d married Sally Hay, and in the final year they never saw each other again. When Liz returned to her California home after his funeral in Switzerland, she found this letter waiting for her: “I want to know how you are, my hatred, my face and my cross, my shadow and my light, my dove and my raven… It’s Sunday afternoon. I drink… My loneliness is a great empty house, as useless as this one. If you could answer me… if it’s not too late for this drunken sailor longing for his harbor… You are like rain and memory, clear and dark, weapon and wound, false and beautiful, burning and cold… There is no life without you. You are the bone and the vein, murky and clear, the wall and the ivy, the grass that will kiss my grave. Deep down, we were never apart. And I think we never will be…”
Norman Tebbit who has died aged 94, was a highly effective minister for Margaret Thatcher, regarded as a political bruiser and parliamentary thug and was once famously described by Michael Foot as a “semi-housetrained polecat”. He turned out to be a politician of substance, grudgingly admired even by those on the left.
Born on 29 March 1931 into the Depression in London in a lower-middle class family, his father lost his job which gave rise to Tebbit’s oft quoted words, to “get on his bike and look for work”.
His career was cut short by the IRA’s bombing of the Grand Hotel in Brighton during the party’s 1984 conference. He was severely injured and his wife Margaret – for whom he cared devotedly – was paralysed for life. He left the government prematurely in 1987 after a stint as party chairman to spend more time with her, and up to her death in 2020 he woke twice every night to turn her.
‘He came closest in her government to mirroring Mrs Thatcher’s visceral feelings, and he took pride in articulating them – to the delight of the man in the street. He shared her deep beliefs in the virtue of hard work, the need to take on the trade unions (he had himself been a union official), the damage to families resulting from sexual licence, the innate un-Britishness of Europe and the subversive nature of the BBC.’
He had an Aries Sun conjunct North Node Uranus in Aries conjunct the UK’s North Node so he would resonate with shared issues and be a catalyst for change. He also had a powerfully confident Jupiter Pluto in Cancer in a tough minded opposition to Saturn and squaring his innovative Sun Uranus; with his Mercury in Aries in an argumentative square to Mars in late Cancer. Pro-active, a go-getter, not subtle but to the point.
He mirrored much of Maggie Thatcher’s chart, 13 October 1925 9am Grantham, England, with her Sun Mars in Libra square Pluto opposition Jupiter which could have turned out to be a tussle for the upper hand – but they held it together to make an influential couple. Their relationship chart had a friendly composite Sun Venus in a possessive/controlling opposition to Pluto square Jupiter. Together they were a force to be reckoned with.
The Brighton Bomb went off at 2.54 am on 12 October 1984 with the Taurus Moon was exactly conjunct the UK’s 8th house Mars (to within five minutes of a degree). And the UK chart was on a Solar Arc Half Return putting the country on alert.
There is not much showing on Norman Tebbit’s chart without a birth time. But it undoubtedly rattled Maggie badly. She was on her Second Saturn Return with tr Saturn crossing her Ascendant starting a downhill slide.
Margaret Tebbit, his wife, paralysed from the chest down in the bombing, was born 24 May 1934 and died in 2020. Her Venus in Aries chimed with her husband’s Aries Sun and their relationship chart had a lively composite Uranus triune Jupiter sextile Mars with a workmanlike Sun square Saturn.
Her natal Mars in Taurus (square Saturn) was conjunct Algol both of which were catching the approaching tr North Node in Taurus in 1984, pulling her into one of the worst political atrocities on the UK mainland.
Tracking the staging posts in life through the cycles of the outer planets in square, opposition and for some Returns to their natal position on a birth chart is an interesting exercise. In a long lifespan there will be three Saturn Returns at 29, 58 and 87; a Uranus Return at 84 and before that two Uranus squares at around 21 and 63 and one mid-life Uranus opposition around 42; as well as a Pluto square and a Neptune square in the early forties, and Pluto and Neptune opposition their natal position in the 80s. Plus a North Node Half Return around 47 and full Return in the late 70s.
Although they individually have the same general meaning, their impact to some extent will depend on the make-up of the chart. A throw-life-in-the-air-and-be-reckless tr Uranus opposition Uranus at the midlife crisis in late 30s/40 will have a more extreme reaction in a highly Uranian temperament that has been itching to kick over the traces and equally will be resisted by those of more stolid temperament.
Saturn Returns will have a stronger effect when there are lessons to be learnt and shirked responsibilities faced.
It will also depend on what other natal planets aspect the outer planet at a critical point in its cycle and indeed whether there are additional transits in the celestial sphere impeding or exaggerating its effect. Nothing happens in isolation.
What has always struck me is transiting Pluto which in a lifetime will only make half a cycle and thus only cast its transformational influence over six houses in a natal chart.
For example, anyone born with a 10th house Pluto will feel its effect through their 11th, 12th, 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th houses (depending slightly on the chart’s make up). They therefore never have Pluto through the 5th to 9th house. In this instance their challenges will be more directed towards changes within themselves as an individual.
Where someone born with a 4th house Pluto will feel its effects through their 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th houses – which being western hemisphere will bring adjustments in relating to others.
These are obvious examples but a natal Pluto in any house will only effect its influence on the following six houses. The same goes for Neptune.
The Saturn Returns are unsurprisingly about growing up, getting real, taking on responsibilities in the first return; and in the latter two being pragmatic about the limitations of age. Making sensible plans.
The first Uranus square at 20/21 is youthful rebellion time, expressing individual needs not always sensibly, reacting against authority and restrictions. The Uranus mid-life opposition late 30s/40 comes when lives have settled into a rut, youthful dreams have not been fulfilled and regrets surface. It is a wake-up call and can lead to reckless decisions – in extremis leave marriage/job and take off on a Jack Kerouac road trip. The next Uranus square in the early 60s is a nudge not to settle into zimmer frame and hearing aids mindset, but keep a youthful outlook.
The mid-life crisis so beloved of Carl Jung from late 30s to early forties encompasses Uranus opposition Uranus, Pluto square Pluto and Neptune square Neptune. The Pluto square Pluto is a challenge to let go the past and whatever is outmoded, and can coincide with a tug-of-war as AnOther in life decides to hold firm to the old ways and the individual needs to fight to clear away what is no longer necessary for the future.
The midlife crisis is a refresher, upending what has become stagnant and could stay that way if not given a revitalizing jolt.
The North Nodal square, opposition and Return are inner staging posts when there needs to be a review of what progress has been made in the life’s journey from the familiar (lazy option) South Node to the challenging development of the unfamiliar North Node.
Naturally none of these occurs in isolation since the outer planets moving into new houses or quadrants in a chart will also have a considerable effect.
Pondering on my own chart – my first Saturn Return (and I have a very Saturnine chart with it on my Midheaven) – I was ill with an indefinable slump for several months, which forced a change in my unhealthy lifestyle, after which my career took off like a rocket. My Second Saturn Return was also a jolt, this time financially as someone I trusted screwed up, leaving me to cope with a mess. NB (nota bene) from Saturn = do it yourself! Which I have done thereafter.
Uranus is trickier since my Moon and Sun are in close hard aspect to my natal Uranus so the Uranus aspects tend to rattle everything in my chart up – which I don’t object to since I like constant movement. During my first Uranus square I was sitting my finals at University in a very heavy degree. It was a tr Uranus Pluto conjunction that was around hitting my Sun, Mercury, Moon, Uranus and I thought Armageddon was coming. It didn’t, I passed – if not with flying colours at least adequately – and I tumbled out of academia swearing never to sit another exam ever again.
My midlife Uranus opposition oversaw a crazy relationship; with a home move and marriage (to someone else) through the Pluto square Pluto etc. The Second Uranus square – not much.
My Nodal Half Return saw me upsticks and relocate home/country. But that was alongside tr Pluto opposition tr Saturn in Gemini upending my Moon Uranus, Sun etc.
Looking back at my list the Saturn Returns stand out and the Nodal squares, oppositions and Return. The major landmarks in my life – moving house, job etc – are not always obvious from the cycles themselves and I would track them through transits to my chart axis, houses and planets. But everyone’s chart is different and certain transits will have more impact depending on individual placings.
“There is beauty to be found in the changing of the earth’s seasons, and an inner grace in honouring the cycles of life.” Jack Kornfield
“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.” Albert Einstein
“It’s not true that life is one damn thing after another; it is one damn thing over and over.” Edna St. Vincent Millay
“Life is like a ten speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use.” Charles M. Schulz
“Unconscious of your story, you are in its grasp; but with consciousness, an alchemical process begins: The solidity of the complex dissolves and you can open up to the arrival of a new archetype, the birth of a new cycle of life. In the shadow, then, lies our myth and our fate.” Connie Zweig
“I see that the greatest thing about getting older is how your judgment changes and how you come to understand the cycles of life. And you keep having these amazing flashes of understanding.” Erica Jong
Popular protests against the Serbian regime and its leader Aleksandar Vučić have been met with increasingly brutal repression. What started as student movement has become a broader citizens’ movement which is calling for civil disobedience and demanding a new election. ‘A large section of Serbians have long been uneasy with his “strongman” style of leadership, since he came to power in 2012. But others have accepted his party’s firm grip on state institutions and much of the media as a trade-off for strong economic growth and improvements in infrastructure.’
Serbia 13 July 1878 2.58 pm Belgrade, has been rattled through this year with tr Uranus conjunct the Pluto in Taurus and square Uranus and Alphard – with the tension-erupting Solar Arc Sturn conjunct the Serbia Uranus at the moment. Which latter is classic Saturnine repression of a rebellious Uranus Pluto uprising.
Mid this month till late July and again in 2025 tr Neptune will conjunct the Serbia Saturn, undermining the rule of law and causing widespread uncertainty. In 2026 it is followed by a Saturn Return hinting at the need to pause for a rethink.
Aleksandar Vučić, 5 March 1970, is a Sun and Venus in Pisces with Venus opposition Pluto in late Virgo which is catching this September’s Solar Eclipse for a change-or-else-warning. It will be all the more pointed since his Pluto is on the focal point of a yod inconjunct Mercury sextile Mars; and he also has another yod onto Saturn in Taurus which is being put under major pressure in 2026/27 by tr Pluto square Saturn.
His 1st Presidency chart of 31 May 2017 – which has North Node, Moon, Alphard conjunct the Serbia Uranus Alphard – has a destabilizing Solar Arc Pluto square the Uranus now; as well as tr Saturn square the Mars across the winter hinting at aggravating setbacks.
His 2nd Presidency chart, 31 May 2022, is pressured this year and in serious trouble in 2026 with failure in the air.
