Happy Birthday Capricorn! Spotlight On...David Sedaris!

 

Hello friends! I hope you all had a beautiful Holiday Season! Not to brag, but this may have been the best Christmas of my life. I didn't have the best Holidays growing up, and for most of my adult life, I've either skipped Christmas or grudgingly gone along with it. But just like everyone said it would, having children changed me, and what do you know? Christmas is actually pretty fun! But now the party is REALLY over and it's time to get back to work. And speaking of hard work, it's Capricorn Season!

  Capricorn is our Cardinal Earth Sign, ruled by Saturn. The Sun enters Capricorn December 22 on the darkest day of the year, and stays there until January 19. Capricorn is the Tenth Sign of our Zodiac. If you looked at a horoscope wheel they way you would a clock, Capricorn would occupy the 12 O'clock placement. Which is interesting because most Capricorns love to seek the highest points. Having Saturn as a ruler makes them naturally hard working and achievement oriented.Which is not to say they can't have fun, but Capricorn fun still tends to be results oriented, as in "Let's see where this nature trail leads!" (Capricorns are the hikers/climbers of the Zodiac.) or "Let's go check out this restaurant I've read good things about." Capricorns do their research and don't like surprises.)

  Capricorn is known as the Sign of The Father and many Capricorns, both male and female, will take a paternal approach to their relationships both personal and professional...with mixed results. Some Capricorns do seem to have a rescuer complex and would rather spend their emotional energy "saving" their more troubled loved ones instead of devoting that energy to themselves and their own inner work. Other less evolved Capricorns can come off as judgmental and dismissive- Richard Nixon, perfect example. Most Capricorns have strong, complicated feelings about their own fathers, but whether these feelings are mostly positive or negative falls to the individual and usually tends to evolve over time. Capricorns themselves tend to make great parents; (and aunts and uncles) loving, nurturing, and encouraging, but with enough fortitude to release their cubs (kids?) into the wild when the time is right. My Father in Law is a Capricorn and he's transitioned into a parent of adults really gracefully. I've never heard him speak to either of his grown children like they were anything other than grown ups, but he's still able to be playful and fun with his young grandchildren. Earthy Capricorn tends to have good boundaries.

  It's been said that Capricorns are born with the hardest path in front of them. The actual Capricorn Constellation is a Mountain Goat with a Fishtail instead of back legs. This is meant to symbolize that hearty Capricorn is destined to rise up from the darkest emotional depths and eventually scale the highest peaks. Most Capricorns I know and love have definitely experienced those watery depths, but have also amazed me with their strength of character and their ability to move through and away from the most challenging of circumstances. Because most Capricorns have experienced some kind of physical or emotional trial by the time they reach adulthood, they tend to have a lovely grounded, stable energy of a person who has really been through something. They also make great storytellers.

"If you aren't cute, you may as well be clever." 

  Which brings us to David Sedaris. Happy Birthday David! David Sedaris is an American born humorist and essayist. His writing has focused on his boisterous eccentric family, growing up in suburban Raleigh, North Carolina, drug use, his struggles with obsessive compulsive behaviors, his adventures with his boyfriend Hugh, and life as an American ex-pat, first in France, now in England.  In typical Capricorn fashion, success found David closer to the second half of his life. His big break occurred when he was invited to share his experiences as an elf in Macy's Santaland on NPR's This American Life. In addition to being a professional elf, Sedaris has also written about his work experiences as a teacher, and apple picker, a publisher's assistant, a professional mover, and a housekeeper. In his essay Smart Guy, Sedaris writes about working for a landscaping company with a man who claimed to have a high IQ, his coworker told him that while this work was temporary for him, but that Sedaris would still be doing manual labor when he was forty, which turned out to be true. Sedaris quips in his essay, "Oh, but that was years ago.Two years ago, to be exact."

  David Raymond Sedaris was born on December 26, 1956 in Johnson City New York. Sadly, his birth time is not known, so we don't know his Rising Sign. The software I use requires a birth time, I have set his  at noon  so we can have something physical to look at, but Sedaris' Rising Sign and other House Placements will not be discussed today.

  In many ways, David Sedaris is your typical Capricorn. He has written before about his struggles with phobias and obsessive compulsive disorder. Capricorns crave order and routine, (Just ask my two year old daughter!) and this can be taken to extremes, especially in early life. Cardinal Signs tend to be high strung, and their Cardinal placement makes Capricorn the most anxious of their Earth Sign Brethren. Substance abuse can be an issue, but because Capricorns tend to respond well to treatment programs and the routine of Twelve step meetings, recovery is easier for them than most. Sedaris' Capricornian self-deprecation is on full display when he writes of his speed use, "Speed eliminates all doubt. Am I smart enough? Do people like me? Do I really look all right in a plastic jumpsuit?" Through his essays, Sedaris has taken us along for the ride as he quit doing speed, stopped drinking, and eventually even gave up cigarettes. It's in long sighted Capricorn's nature to want to lead by example.

 In Astrology, writing is said to fall under the Moon's domain, maybe because our Moon is said to determine how we express our feelings. The placement of a Moon also describes a person's relationship with their mother. David's late mother, Sharon, was the star of many of his essays. He once described her as possessing a haunted quality that he very much admired. So it's no surprise that Sedaris' Moon is in Scorpio. Scorpio rules secrets, and also sex and death. A Moon in Scorpio is going to give a person a very intense quality, a fascination with the darker aspects of human nature, and possibly even an interest in the macabre. Sedaris has written before about purchasing a skeleton, owning taxidermied animals, and wanting a Victorian era model of a human throat for Valentine's Day. In another essay, he writes about a lost tourist coming into his house in Normandy for directions, and how it made him consider how much his home resembled a serial killer's lair. His often talked about love of Soap Operas and the various bizarre entanglements their various characters find themselves in, could also be aided my his Moon in Scorpio. It's hard to keep your feeling a secret around a Moon in Scorpio and David Sedaris has proven through his writing to be an excellent judge of character, picking up on the qualities of people around him that others may have missed. Sedaris' Moon is also Sextile his Sun, which brings blessings of creativity, and his Moon Conjunct Neptune helps him be sensitive to the moods and energies of the people around him. (The better to study them!)

  Mercury rules communication. David Sedaris' Mercury is in Capricorn along with his Sun. (Having a Sun and Mercury in the same sign is actually pretty common because Mercury is never too far from the Sun.) According to Astrology Guru Robert Hand, Mercury in Capricorn can result in a person who is basically serious, but also quite funny. Truuuuth. I think Mercury in Capricorn is what helps Sedaris write about his history of substance abuse, his recovery and other uncomfortable topics in a way that is simple, unemotional, and not self pitying. He once said that at fifty he's afraid of  "almost everything" but I don't really think that's true. Mental illness, specifically addiction, is unfortunately still a very taboo subject in our culture, and it takes a certain kind of fearless to share your journey with the world.

"I just looked at the pattern of my life, decided I didn't like it, and changed."

  David Sedaris didn't become the literary superstar he is today until he was in his forties. Later in life success is generally attributed to Saturn, the Planet of Hard Work that rewards Perseverance. Sedaris' Saturn falls in Sagittarius. Free Spirited Sag is made more conservative and traditional by the presence of Saturn. People with this placement can come off as a little old fashioned and they crave routine. His Saturn in Sagittarius is Square his Pluto in Virgo. This can be a somewhat difficult angle, because it can cause a person to hate/fear change and also possibly struggle with depression. The blessing of this influence is that it can give a person a steely resolve that can help them overcome almost any obstacle. This makes me think about when Sedaris wrote about how after he met his future boyfriend Hugh for the first time, he raised his fist and proclaimed, Hugh Hamrick you WILL be mine!" Interestingly, Mars is Trine Saturn in David Sedaris' chart, and this influence tends to make a person the aggressor in relationships.

  In an interview with Slate a few years back, Ira Glass said that something that he really enjoys about Davis Sedaris is that he is gifted at describing situations where he doesn't quite fit in, and quite often these situations are self created. Like working on an apple farm in Washington, visiting a nudist colony, living abroad in France and England, his sabbatical in Japan, or his adventures traveling in general. Whenever someone consistently swims upstream or regularly stands out for whatever reason, we need to take a look at what good ole Irregular Uranus is up to in their chart. In Sedaris' chart, Jupiter is Sextile Uranus. This is an extremely favorable influence that brings the blessing of an interesting life. Opportunities for travel are common with this influence, as well as acclaim for creative endeavors. Uranus is actually Sedaris' most strongly placed planet with a total of 7 aspects to other planets. A many aspected planet in one's chart is going to impact a person's daily life and personality, as well as their life's journey. David Sedaris certainly seems to have been shaped by Uranus, the planet of Eccentricity. Venus Trine Uranus probably gives Sedaris an affinity for other eccentrics and a desire to lead an unconventional life. Mars Trine Uranus probably helped cement this quality and also gave him the courage to be himself even in the face of adversity or intolerance. This aspect probably also helped him accomplish some of his more daring feats like hitchhiking across the country several times in his twenties.

  David Sedaris was born with Uranus in Leo. Uranus stays in a sign for around seven years, so this is almost a generational placement. The gift of this placement is that it allows people to have pride in their individualistic tendencies. Leos may think they're a gift to the world sometimes, but Uranus in Leo's gift to all of us is an example of creative, passionate, people living unconventional lives on their own terms. A few other people born under this intense influence are David's sister Amy Sedaris, President Barack Obama, Gary Oldman, Micheal Jackson, Oprah Winfrey Carl Jung, and Aleister Crowley.

  I guess my favorite thing about David Sedaris as a writer and as a person is that through his essays and short stories, he takes you on these weird little journeys where somehow he's the normal one and everyone else is strange. When I was a young adult reading his books for the first time, they really gave me hope that it would be possible for me to move through life just being  my weird self and that I could still be happy and loved. Or at least end up with good stories to tell. So Happy Birthday David Sedaris and all you other weird, wonderful, wound up Capricorns out there, I hope you all are feeling well rested, centered, and excited about the next chapter of your life story.I'm glad you're here. Namaste.