Mars takes about two years to make a lap around the entire zodiac, spending roughly two months in each sign. It’s a nice, human-scale planetary cycle – less breathtakingly speedy than the Moon’s 28 day sprint, but not as tediously protracted as Saturn’s 29 year journey through the signs. In human terms, it’s the happy difference between traveling to a new city for a weekend versus moving there for the rest of your life. Two months gives you enough time to poke around and get a taste of the place’s high points, and to unpack and spend a little time living there, rubbing shoulders with the locals.
On August 3, visiting Mars moved into Cancer, a tourist destination in which the warrior planet is inclined to feel especially cranky – a bit jet-lagged, a tad homesick, with a jangly stomach and an unnerving tendency to burst into tears. Mars is built for arid, inhospitable landscapes; when he ventures to the sandy shores of Cancer’s natural habitat, the result looks less like a quiet, reflective seaside vacation than a recreation of the Normandy invasion.
Mars in Cancer was not about to spend August lounging in a beach chair reading romance novels, and if you’ve attempted to enjoy some vacation time this month, the results have likely been mixed. Mars in Cancer may have arrived at your vacation beach cottage, ignored the hammock and iced tea you’d prepared, and set to work patching the leaking roof, collecting driftwood for bonfires, and perching near the water’s edge, ready to spring into action as an impromptu lifeguard.
Impatient with the idea of leisure, Mars has also found his fellow beachcombers extremely vexing, making square aspects to Uranus (August 9) and Saturn (August 25) and an opposition to Pluto (August 10). You may have noticed that many people have seemed particularly out of sorts this month, defending their territory with vigorous displays of temper and emotion. Between Mars’ problems and a particularly exasperating Mercury retrograde period (Aug. 2 – 26), it’s been hard to get anything done; the resulting frustration has made it nearly impossible to contain hurts and aggravations we’ve carefully curated since Mars last visited Cancer.
However, I come not to bury Mars in Cancer (up to his head in sand), but to praise him: it is a matchless cycle for bravely confronting the past, for making a difficult change in your home (such as moving or renovation), or for changing your diet – both physically and in terms of the media and other messages that you “feed” yourself.
Mars should stay out of mischief for the rest of his Cancerian visit (through September 18), even receiving a beautiful sextile aspect from Venus (September 10). Like any renovation project, the worst part comes at the beginning, just after the demolition, when pieces of your life are shattered and strewn around, cutting your bare feet if you’re not careful. But in time, there are signs of progress and rebuilding. Eventually, the messes get cleaned up. And before you know it, your home will be in order… and your vacation beach house will have a new roof.
