Virgo: When's the last time you really gave yourself permission to watch a sunrise or sunset for more than a few seconds? I bet this activity has fallen so far off your list of things to do that if left to your own devices you may not treat yourself to it for months. That's just one reason I feel called to do an intervention. The other reason has to do with your current astrological omens. They say that you desperately need to be lifted up out of the everyday trance and exposed to sublime beauty; that you need to commune with our home star, the source of all the energy that fuels your life.

How very fitting. In the last 36 hours, I have had both incredibly beautiful and terribly heartbreaking experiences. It would not be right to discuss the former here, but as for the latter, Michael and I exchanged stuff last night, we split our bills and we said goodbye.

There was no fighting, yelling. No recriminations. Just sadness. The kind of sadness that is unavoidable and necessary. The hardest part was seeing him cry. He broke down and wept. He asked if there was any way to fix us, to make it okay again. I saw his heart break again when I said there wasn't. We'd spent too much time averting our eyes as it was.

And so it goes. I asked him to write when it's okay for him to do so. We should keep in touch, even if it's only in that strange way that Kendell and I do. Christmas cards, occasional notes from here or there. I just want to know he'll be okay. That he's getting on with life. He left me with a box the color of the night sky, the moon hand-painted in silver. I will fit our life together inside it.

There was a letter, and he wondered when it was exactly that I fell out of love with him. And there really wasn't a specific point for me, just a slow series of realizations. Why did I do that? Why doesn't it hurt as much as it's supposed to? The thing is, I do love him. I'm just not sure that I'm in love with him any longer. It's that tiny distinction that makes all the difference. I tried to blur the two for half a year, and it almost worked. Almost. We are simply no longer the people we once were. I can't be the innocent girl he fell in love with, and I think that that kills him more than anything else. He's become so different as well. It's time for our paths to diverge-- things are now in the hands of fate.

On with life. There is too much to see, too much to keep afloat. Too much beauty to miss. There is a sense of freedom now, a loss of constriction. In my way, I'm ready to keep going down the path. There are already things beginning to bloom-- tangents and possibilities. I have proof that life can be both unspeakably sublime and quietly harrowing all in the same day. So as they say, onward. Onward.

Today, I set my altar for spring. I went for a walk to buy some cloth, and yes, before you ask, I am the kind of girl who goes for walks in the squalling rain. I find it's the best time to have a conversation with the powers upstairs, good prayer time. It's like I'm on their turf, or we're meeting halfway. I have had some incredibly rewarding experiences alone in the rain, very personal ones and moving ones. It's purifying in a way, the sensation of being soaked to the skin and yet so calm.

I bought cloth in peach blossom and sage green. I buffed my brass taper holders and set out the shells and stones I collected on the shore. Sage, salt, a wreath of dried flowers and a vase of fresh ones. New, fresh, vibrant. Symbolic, so much of my life is symbolic. I cleaned out my room and bathed it in the light of amber-scented candles. I feel very much at peace.

My vocal lesson went well-- the Puccini piece is coming along well, and I've been working on the translation to DuParc's "Chanson Triste," because a piece is always much more meaningful to me if I have some personal investment in it. Besides, I love Jean Lahor's poetry-- he also wrote the text to "Extase," which is one of my personal favorite songs in any language. It's so... quietly beautiful, desperately passionate in a whisper. The sigh of the calm between lovers.

Astronomy comes now, and so I have to leave now. It feels a little like leaving sacred space, since I've spent a good amount of time today creating just that. A place of calm and beauty.