Sorting in the Stars
Special interests, complex systems, and pretty charts
Hey, what’s your sign?
Oh, I’m glad you asked! I’m a Taurus Sun, Aquarius Moon, with Scorpio rising and Pluto in Libra in the 12th house. I’ve also got an Air Grand Trine of Pluto in the 12th, Venus in the 8th, and the Moon in the 4th, a Taurus Sun-Mars-Mercury-Chiron stellium in my 7th house, Saturn conjunct my Ascendant in the 12th house, and the Moon conjunct my IC in the 4th house. See?
Somehow, I’m guessing that’s not what most people are looking for when they start talking horoscopes at a party. But for the last 20-odd years, that’s usually the way I’ve answered the question. Because that’s what you do with special interests.
Even if you don’t know much about autistic people, you probably know a few stereotypes-with-grains-of-truth. We have deep interests that can bring us as much joy and healing as our human loved ones (fact! our brains light up the same way when seeing our favorite stuff as they do seeing our favorite people), and we love complex systems. That’s a big reason why so many of us enjoy (and create) genre fiction—it gives us literally a whole world to study.
I’ve gone back and forth over the years on how much credence I give to astrology. I know all the arguments that the descriptions are generic, the studies that show that astrologers weren’t able to match charts with querents with accuracy better than random chance, that the constellations aren’t even in the same places anymore that they were when the system was developed. I’m a scientific person with a PhD; I know the fact that a two-thousand-year-old divination system tells me I’m SO MUCH A TAURUS I may as well have horns probably isn’t the reason I’m stubborn and slow to change my mind and very attached to my stuff (at least, not unless all autistic people are also Tauruses). But I’m also a firm believer in being able to hold two stories, two truths, in my mind at once. The days can be getting longer as we creep toward Spring Equinox because the Northern Hemisphere is tipping back towards the sun AND because the young sun is growing and getting stronger and coming into more of his full power. In my world, there’s room for both.
Like other special interests, my astrology focus has waxed and waned depending on what else is going on in my life. In my case, the surest recipe for reviving a special interest is having someone in my life to talk about it with—so when I arrived at college and discovered that someone in my orientation group had brought the same big purple astrology book that I owned, it was obvious we were meant to be friends forever. (For the record: still friends, almost 8000 miles apart and almost 24 years later). I’ve cast charts for most of the people I’ve been close to in my life, because it’s quick and easy and most people enjoy my amateur back-of-the-envelope “cliff notes” interpretations. I also routinely cast charts for characters as a way to help with character development and a tool for differentiating them from me. So at this point, I’ve got quite a collection. But it’s been a long time since I’ve sat down, pulled out my books, and tried to do a full-blown chart interpretation.
For the last week, though, I’ve been doing just that.
See, I’ve got a local friend who I learned last summer is also interested. We’ve been planning an astrology date for about seven months now, but now we’ve finally got a DATE for it, and a third friend who’s going to join us. Three moms, without our kids(!!!), meeting up to talk about our charts.
So now I’m digging around in their birth charts, trying to figure out the best way to distill all the information the system says is in there without writing them each a 20-page report. Because trust me: it could easily be a 20-page report. Or a 50-page report. Like any good sci-fi or fantasy world, like any good roleplaying system, like any good academic subject, there’s layers upon layers upon layers, all logical, all part of a predictable, unified system. My favorite thing.
I hope I have the time to write each of my friends a short report (as opposed to a long one, which as the proverbial saying goes, inevitably takes much less time!), but if I don’t, I’ll come in with a pile of notes and we’ll still have a good time geeking out together. Which is, after all, the point.
General Cliffs Notes for the next time astrology comes up for you at a party:
Your Sun sign is the sign you’re most likely to know, the answer to “what’s your sign.” It’s a very important part of your chart, symbolizing your core identity, but the Moon also has a sign in your chart, as do (at least) eight other planets. Each planet symbolizes a different part of yourself: the Moon, for example, is your emotional side, your subconscious and memories. And there’s loads of minor influences that can be included in a chart to add nuance.
Everyone has all 12 horoscope signs in their birth chart, and is influenced by all 12. I like the analogy of the signs as filters or lenses; they color the effects of whatever they touch, and the more things they touch (like if you have lots of planets in the same sign), the stronger their influence.
A chart is divided into 12 “houses” (you can see them on my chart at the top of the post), each of which represents a part of your life. Houses with planets in them are usually where your focus is in this lifetime. The sign on the cusp of the first house (at 9:00 on the clock face) is your rising sign, and is believed to be the public face you present to the world.
Because the chart is a circle, every planet is plotted with a degree: these degrees make angles and can create positive or negative interactions between the planets.
There’s some basics for you. And I didn’t even get into relationship astrology or divination (which is the stuff your newspaper horoscope is playing at the edges of). But if you’re curious, my favorite go-to resources are:
The Only Astrology Book You’ll Ever Need, by Joanna Martine Woolfolk
Astrology for Dummies, by Rae Orion
Astro.com for casting charts
Cafe Astrology for digging into some of the more esoteric interpretation stuff.
So go forth. Enjoy this vast orderly world to play in. I promise it’s just as much fun as figuring out which Hogwarts house you’re in.