First Quarter Moon February 29, 2012

Jose Argüelles’s, the great Mayan scholar and advocate for a “new time” in the form of a calendar based on the 13 moon cycle and the symbols of the Maya, included in his time keeping a “day out of time” to accommodate the 365 approximate days it takes for the earth to circle the sun. Today’s Leap Year 29th day of February is the crudest example of Argüelles’s conception if this phenomenon that the creators of the Gregorian calendar could make.

In Argüelles’s conception of time, far too complicated a discussion to have here, time=art as opposed to the function of time keeping of the Gregorian’s in which time=money. The Day Out of Time, a totally Piscean idea by the way, is a day for art, party, and leisure…anything goes sort of thing—since of course there is a suspension of “time”. I’ll take this over the Leap Year day anytime. I mean, this is the strangest day, and, to me at least, typifies how out of rhythm we are with natural forces and cycles. Every 4 years there’s an extra day in February to account for the extra time lost in a 4 year cycle. That doesn’t sound nice at all does it?

Anyhow, that is today, and coincides with the First Quarter Moon, the cycle which pertains to the first “crisis in action” according to the great astrologer Dane Rudhyar. At this stage in the process the moon is forming what is called a square in astrology, a 90 degree angle with the Sun. From the process of observation (of events and experiences) and correlation (with symbols and planetary alignments) astrologers have been able to determine that this aspect causes and is related to tension.

Tension can be experienced in several ways and has several functions. Tension can be challenging, like a busy city street on a hot, muggy day, with horns honking and people yelling. Tension can also be a strengthening of something like the pitching of a tent which allows you to lie down and watch the stars at night. Both of these clearly express tension differently but both are called tension and that is how this aspect, the square, manifests.

With the Sun still in Pisces along with Chiron, Neptune conjunct and Mercury still in the late stages there and the Moon in Gemini, the tension, the crisis in action, I feel is related to the polarity of the dream body and the waking body. Pisces is associated with the dream body that experience of reality that is murkier, etheric, colorful, and mystical. Gemini is more tied into this world subjectively taking in and putting out information. So there will be this urge to radiate poetic and playful expressions at odds with, or attempting to find peace with an emotional urge to think and organize. Sounds like what many producing artists experience all the time. So find one of them if you know one for survival tips for the next few days.

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