I still have some sessions open this month—you can book one here, or buy me a cup of coffee here if you’re feeling tipsy :)

Gemini season has arrived and brought with it one thousand tiny threats, and a few treats for good measure. In the mutable air of the twins, we are forced to hold contradictions. Simultaneous experiences that run the gamut from torture to bliss.

For instance, summer is beautiful here in the Rio Grande valley. Our little corner of Rio Arriba County is ripe with fruit trees, alfalfa, and kitchen vegetables. Wild and cultivated roses dot every fence line. Fat earthworms wriggle and squirm with every fistful of dirt displaced. Though much of New Mexico is struggling under drought conditions, heavily reliant upon snow pack to supplement the seasonal monsoons, this particular patch is fed by an irrigation ditch that pulls directly from the Rio Grande. The water table is high and the soil is loamy and fertile. Things just want to grow here.

Water is Life is the English translation of a Lakota phrase: “Mní wičhóni”. It adorns bumper stickers across the state, and is certainly true. Of course, nature doesn’t red-line districts. All life prospers here in this valley.

Alongside the abundance of wildflowers and apples are Siberian Elms, Russian Olives, and a whole host of other so-called ‘invasive species’. I want to hold this lightly, as it is clear that these are non-native plants but aren’t I, too? Who am I to judge what is thriving in this place it was not meant to be? Still, they are a formidable force, and the source of much consternation and futile efforts at containment and eradication.

Every year, the utility company pulls up with a cherry picker and a handful of workers in yellow vests and hardhats, going at last year’s growth with chainsaws and an enormous mulcher. And every year, they grow back—hydras spawning from single trunks.

But that’s not all: bindweed, wild licorice, burdock, ragweed, and cheat grass all thrive here, too. They will swallow any patch left untended, particularly if they’ve gotten any taste of water. Virginia creepers and grape vines snake their way through the orchard, completely consuming the apple and pear trees if left to their own devices.

The taller the grass, the happier the root systems of the orchard trees, but they are not the only ones rejoicing. All this water and greenery brings red ants, mosquitoes, flea beetles, and aphids bearing down as soon as the nights warm. Golden hour is particularly treacherous, as clouds of mosquitoes descend just seconds after we lift the latch on the dog pen and venture into the orchard. They dive and bite when we wade through the bosque to cool off in the river. Coddling moths nestle into the apple drop from the year before and emerge in early June, eager to wriggle into the budding fruit.

We have birds galore, a straggling coyote, and a very cute family of skunks. Everybody eats, from crab apples to black walnuts to black oil sunflower seed. But this also brings squirrels, who lure our neighbors dogs into an old corrugated steel shed a few hundred yards from the house, where they nip and howl and shit. They get into the engine blocks of our vehicles and chew through cables. We have gophers, too, who aerate the soil and help spread irrigation to high spots, but also have a taste for young saplings and their roots.

Every beautiful thing, every bit of peace and pleasure to be found here, must be doggedly defended against entropy. We love the white line sphinx moths that visit Jennye’s Datura blooms, but they are born of tomato horn worms. What is the proper proportion of sacrifice? What must we feed the gods to ensure our own good fortune?

The dog’s pen has become a veritable minefield. Remember those foxtails I mentioned in passing? Well, it turns out the Reddit threads are right. Two vet trips and a minor surgery later, and Jennye and I are now taking turns hand pulling them from the dog pen— which we recently expanded— and using a shop vac to suck up the remaining seed drops. There is now a small mountain of contractor bags full of these tiny lawn darts that perniciously burrow into paw pads and ear cavities, which will require another dump run, and will unfortunately cause more methane in the atmosphere. But what are the other options? Pass this problem down the line for another farmer or pet owner? Break the burn ban to incinerate them?

The same evolutionary edge that has made these seeds so good at planting themselves in the soil creates a formidable and pervasive enemy for pets and other animals. Soft flesh gives way much more easily than dry packed dirt. Horror stories tell of them burrowing into blood vessels or internal organs, surgeries costing thousands and near death experiences. One friend of Jennye’s told of a dog developing PICA and eating them, quietly creating a hairball like mass of them in their stomach that had to be removed under anesthesia.

“I’ve found them in every orifice. Every orifice,” our vet quipped as Pluto whined and panted her way through her second vet visit in 6 days. Echo was in even sorrier shape, yelping at every kitten and puppy that popped up in ads for free vaccinations or spay/neuter clinics on the flat screen TV in the exam room.

Now every dog bathroom break requires a full examination of paw pads and the webbed fur between the toes. Every bit of excitement for Echo and Pluto is now paired with some discomfort and our searching fingers, spreading and pinching and needling them.

These conditions demand vigilance and acceptance, which are also hard to hold at once. A big hill to climb and slide down and climb again. It is so exhausting to be so poised to identify and neutralize threats that perhaps that enables a kind of surrender, but it is neither blissful nor relieving.

The work itself is mind numbing and uncomfortable. Backs and fingers ache from hunching and pulling. We cannot stop but we don’t know if we’ll ever finish. And all of this is fit into the cracks between the larger responsibilities. Our small businesses to run, meals to make, chores to tend, and perhaps even little pleasures to pursue. There is not a minute unaccounted for, besides the ninety or so between dinner and bed, when we take turns on the heated crystal mat and let our brains melt out of our ears with some high or low brow entertainment projected on the wall. When Pluto is free from her cone and heaves her big warm body gratefully against one of us and Echo nuzzles into the armpit of the other, perhaps after giving a demanding swipe to the shoulder of an arm that is too close to a body for him to snuggle in.

There can be a certain slippery nature to Gemini energy and I think some of it is tied to their ease of acceptance of paradox. Remember that mutable signs are known as ‘dual-bodied’, and, in tropical astrology, mark the periods of time that move between seasons. Transitions are points of merging and emergence, moments that require alchemy, that make visible what is always morphing, shifting, moving, anticipating, responding, growing, shrinking, living, and dying. What is Gemini if not an energy of connection? Here we have an insatiable thirst for information, with an abundance of tolerance for variance and incongruence. As soon as we begin to judge or refute something, our curiosity shrinks. There is some requirement to be open to all iterations if we wish to keep receiving transmissions.

Though known as the twins, the symbol of Gemini is two pillars, perhaps holding some threshold, a doorway into a place of initiation. In the tarot, the High Priestess is often depicted between these pillars, guarding the egress. The very contradictions that make us so uncomfortable may well be the glue holding it all together; the doorway to the other side. Libra wants to balance these relationships, seeking symmetry. All Gemini cares to do is connect the dots. The steward of mutable air is tied to relationships that are built on proximity or necessity. Neighbors, siblings, schoolmates. Those we are thrust into familiarity with. Libra gives choice in the form of partnerships and contracts. Aquarius attempts to create a larger order, to anticipate and interpret patterns, and thus provide a village. Ideally, this is a constellation of relationships wherein each offers what they have in abundance, and receives what they need in exchange.

That is not what’s happening right now on this place called Earth. But it does offer some model, some map that we might grope towards even as we are confronted with the this current moment.

And what of this moment? This relentlessness, this terror, this violent cacophony with bursts of absurdity peppered throughout. The strong men are as cartoonish and predictable as they are stupid and cruel. How are we meant to hold ourselves responsible and accountable when there appear to be no true mechanisms for justice on the larger scale? How do we stay informed while being intentional with our attention? How do we accept some degree of futility while remaining diligent? Is it as simple as following the thread, of seeing whats on the other end of the line? Is this what forms the relationships between the Mercurial and the Jupiterian, the micro and the macro? Is optimism what happens when you start getting curious about pessimism? Is gratitude what occurs when you begin to question despair?

There is some riddle here and I don’t think I know the answer, but I believe that Gemini does. Not one person, but the energy, and the invitation we are receiving from Uranus’ travel through the sign and the Solar consciousness we are having access to with the Sun here, too. There is something about prodding and poking and joking and questioning and holding things ever so lightly. Of asking “But why?” Of not being afraid to learn something that might change our minds. Of letting things be more than one thing at one time. Of not worrying so much about rigid definition and instead asking for more nuance, more variety, more options, more flavors. Of getting a little bit messier and a lot more curious.

Everything is impossible and terrible and the sun keeps coming up. The work will never be finished but I will never be bored. The mosquitoes are here but so are my neighbor’s cherries. Our beloved hounds cause the greatest comfort and the most anxiety of any relationship I’m currently in. The list goes on—nearly everything is included, every pleasure sewn to some pain like Peter Pan’s shadow. Every luxury revealing some poverty. Every minute of rest requiring some labor. Every birth a death. Every relationship a future estrangement. They come together, some times at once, some times with decades between them. But there is always a price, always another side to things. There are always strings attached. You cannot trade one for another; you must take both. Do you see?

horoscopes + more support

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rose virginia live

Northern New Mexico! My next show is June 20th at the Dixon Toolshed Summer Music Fest. Its a very sweet outdoor venue nestled in with a lavender farm and small orchard right along the Embudo River, and there is a bevy of local talent on display. Make a day of it! You can buy tickets and learn more here.