TGIT: The First New Moon of the Year (Patreon)

Hello and happy Ffffff-THURSDAY, patrons. Uh oh, switching it up! I’m posting today because tomorrow I’ll be spending some QT with my parents. Also…new moon alert, new moon alert, new moon alert! We have a new moon in Capricorn today, 1/11, that I wanted to bring to your attention. Look, I’m a passive, and sometimes aggressive, fan of astrology but I still have to Google “what do you do on new moons” when they happen. Celestial digital witch, Google, says new moons are ideal for goal and intention setting. Yes, yes, right, right. Tonight we can manifest to our hearts content. And yes, we just did a shit ton of goal setting less than two weeks ago…but now seems like a fun time to get real with those resolutions. I feel like it’s around this time that we can start to see what we’re conquering and what we’re squandering…regardless of the connection to the new moon or anything astrologically-minded.

But, I’m gonna keep it in the realm of astrology for just another moment...please and thank you.

My Many Moons Lunar Planner had another amazing entry by Sarah Faith Gottesdiener, the creator of the planner and author of the ‘soft strength’ inspired post. In the entry titled “Reality Checks: New Moon in Capricorn” she talks about her unsettled feeling while working on this year’s planner. She usually goes away into nature to do her rituals and channeling, but this year, because of financial and health restraints she stayed home (SAME, GIRL). She writes that she felt almost too messy to do the work that she does, joking, “my identity is a compost heap.” A joke that I thoroughly love and deeply resonate with. I read that and thought “that’s what it feels like!” Especially the ‘heap’ part. What a fun word. Not thoroughly depressing, just slightly pathetic, with notes of haphazardness and disorder. Like an embodied audible sigh. Most of 2023 I felt like a heap. A pile of confusion, a muddled jumble, a puddle of puzzlement. I’ll stop using the thesaurus now. I felt like a heap.

And now, the image of compost heap feels even more appropriate. A pile of old bits that lay a messy foundation for new bits to grow? Oh yes, that tracks. My identity is a compost heap.

There’s new stuff starting to grow, but it’s hard to tell what the ‘stuff’ is just yet. From a distance, it’s still very much in the heap category.

I’ve felt itchy this week. *insert easy joke about the limited amount of showers I currently take*

Emotionally itchy. Frazzled. Scattered. Like there’s a little inch worm of anxiety crawling around on the tip top of my emotional skin.

There’s a lot going on. Well, not a lot. Just enough to feel like a lot. Good stuff, too. I’m in a rotation of processing the recent past and scheduling the near future. The space between treatments is topsy turvy. Chemo was easy in the sense that it was inherently a very black and white routine. Sit in a building plugged into poison for one day. Go home for twenty one days and suffer through it. Rinse, repeat. Once radiation starts it will be daily for twenty weekdays, a new black and white routine for a month. There’s a smattering of doctor’s appointments before that schedule starts. I finally get to see my parents this weekend. It will be very emotional. So many creative things to try to tackle, but no clarity of schedule just yet. Our floors need to be mopped. A lot of my hair continues to fall out, I should cut it all off. Who gets a head cold after cancer? Goose is so old now. Did I schedule the CT scan? How exactly is Marcellus going to help Tova???

swat swat swat

The thoughts flutter like zoo butterflies as I accidentally

SWAT SWAT SWAT

Not in front of the children.

Well, one child. She’s like me, but younger. Who finally yells

GOOD GOD, FUCKING STOP IT.

She means well. And it’s helpful.

When I stop swatting the thoughts they just… fly around, land where they want, and go on their way. Turns out they’re not actually trying to hurt me. They’re not venomous, snarled teeth monsters with knives for hands? Surely my blind assumption that they were venomous, snarled teeth monsters with knives for hands must be correct. It’s not? Hmmmm. So I don’t …have to…swat? I see. But it’s so reflexive. Something to notice.

Reminder to chill the fuck out. Let go. Give into the ways of the heap. Let things happen as they may and notice. Take care of the heap. Make sure it’s a fertile compost pile… things will grow.

“Last year was a lot. This next year will be too.

You may still need a bit more time and space to process the old, so that you may continue to step forward into the weird, wild, new.”

I love how Sarah writes. I’m really going to enjoy this planner this year.

“Use this New Moon for reality checks…Do not use the dull version of someone else’s reality as a template for your own. Admit where you are confused or uncomfortable, and love yourself anyway. Let what needs to die, compost.”

Do not use the dull version of someone else’s reality as a template for your own.

~NiiiiiiCE~

No matter where you land on the “it’s bullshit” to “it’s brilliant” spectrum in regard to astrology or that mischievous moon, tonight and/or tomorrow is maybe a nice time to gently check yourself. Maybe remind yourself, with the utmost respect, to chill the fuck out if you find yourself swatting. Just rest, you heap.

Okay, thanks for letting me ramble over here! Lots of fun stuff happening on this patreon. Mamrie and I are very excited about everything moving forward. I hope you all enjoy your weekends. I’ll be enjoying it with good ol Mother Theresa, can’t wait to see that wild woman! Thanks, as always, for being here! 💚G