It’s a cool, cloudy Friday here in northern Germany, not so different from other summer days. My lover just called and we made plans to meet tonight on the 7:02 train. She’s only been home for a couple of days, so we’re ready for a weekend together.

She spent a week at a conference in L. A., while I stayed in Bremen and took daily meditative walks in Knoops Park. Knoops is a big tract of land, just a couple of bus stops from our apartment, and it’s criss-crossed with paths for bikers, runners, dog-walkers, lovers, old folks, and children. There are concrete paths in bright sunlight, and muddy paths that meander along under shade trees. Sometimes little bridges take you to the other side of the river. Once I followed a path and ended up in the middle of a cornfield.

As I walked in the park, the paths forked, offering me choices, and I went left or right without really knowing what I would find. I tried to remember what I did, though. I wanted to find my way back to the bus stop, and preferably arrive there just one minute before the bus did. I didn’t always manage this, and more often arrived with three or four minutes to wait, begrudging the minutes when I could have been walking.

While I walked, I contemplated my particular trajectory, all fifty-seven years of it. Like a fractal, there are large patterns echoed in smaller patterns, and one of these is the voyage and the return. On some level, I am always either venturing out, or retracing my steps in the other direction. Every experience has its shadow, the time of remembering and understanding, the time when you bring it home.

So while my lover bodily went over the sea and then returned to me, I did it on a much smaller scale. I went into the woods every day and returned to the bus stop.

One thing about being an astrologer is that all the patterns of life are circular to me. Everything ventures out, and everything comes home and rests before venturing out again. And within every larger cycle, there are a million smaller cycles: seasons, days, breaths.

I know that I am in the second half of my life, the returning phase. But with each inhalation, I take in the unknown. I leap onto the unwritten page, heady with the excitement, dizzy with uncertainty. And afterwards there’s a shift, a turning, a pause for learning.

While I was walking in Knoops Park, the sun was in the moon-ruled sign Cancer, so my psyche was especially attuned to circular shapes. Now the sun has moved into fiery, passionate Leo. In the two days since this has happened, there’s been more excitement than in the last week. There have been parties, barbecues, frantic searches for missing objects, collapsing candles, appointments with bureaucratic, split-second timing, and of course, my brilliant lover next to me in bed.

Still, Venus will be in Cancer throughout most of August, and so there will continue to be an emphasis on circles, on repeating patterns, and on the return to safety. Throughout most of August as well, Mercury will be in the deliberate, analytical sign Virgo. Both of these things are very good for the debate on health care in the U.S., and for the chance of passing some kind of useful bill in this area.

There are risks involved in any major governmental change, and people are nervous about it. But with the sun in Leo, risk is natural. Of course, since I live in Germany, I have a harder time seeing what’s so difficult about the concept of universal health care. But the United States is a conservative country in many ways, born with the sun in the security-conscious sign Cancer.

Looking at the U.S.’s natal chart, we see that Saturn will be moving over the U.S.’s natal Neptune in Virgo this month. This underlines the struggle for health care reform, since Neptune is the planet of charity and compassion, and Virgo is the sign of health.

Neptune is also the planet of confusion, however, and Neptune in Virgo in the U.S. natal chart has pointed to a history of health fads in the U.S. Through the centuries, this country has gone nuts over various kinds of health treatments, diet plans, curative regimens and bottled elixirs. Even prohibition was an attempt to purify the body. What other country has gone so far? Now, with the effort to turn health care into something more sensible, every special interest is emerging from the woodwork and working hard to keep the populace confused.

Saturn is the planet of realism, however, and with Saturn moving over Neptune, there will be some rigorous attempts to clarify the health care picture. Barack Obama’s Mars is right on the U.S.’s Neptune in Virgo as well, so he is going to take a stand right there. He is going to battle his way through a fog of misconceptions, fears and inertia. It won’t be easy, especially with Saturn on his Mars, constantly reminding him how high the stakes are.

The full moon brings a lunar eclipse, and it will happen right at sunset in Washington DC. With the moon in Aquarius, this could mean an emphasis on women, our education, and our daily lives. For instance, a strong female leader could take the stage at that point.

The next new moon will occur on August 20, a little before sunrise in Washington DC. With the sun and moon in Leo opposing Neptune, it looks like the next lunar cycle will be a little wild and crazy. The confusion factor will be high, but there is also a chance for spiritual breakthroughs, and for a collective understanding of the way everything fits together. There will be an emphasis on myth, magic, and underlying beliefs, but at the same time, it will be a very active time. It’s the beginning of a lunar cycle in which a great deal happens.

For Barack Obama, there’s a karmic flavor to this August 20 new moon, since it occurs across his natal lunar nodes. And so he may return to a fight that he’s fought before, a struggle for principled leadership. His larger karmic cycles intersect with the larger cycles of the United States.

With the sun in Leo, we are asked to tap into our courage, confidence and daring. But we also know that wherever we go, whatever we attempt, there will always be a reckoning of some sort, and a time of returning. And after this, we always set out again.

Index of Jenny Yates' Writings on Lesbian.com