This is the Part II update for the Gemini 2 decan, for the Nine of Swords.
The image above does not do the scene justice, but shows just a small section of a large flock of these yellow and black swallowtail butterflies encountered on a bike ride. There were tons of them, all clustered in one area. I think someone must have spilled a sugary drink there or something.
This admittedly is not related to the Gemini 2 decan, except for that I associate butterflies with Gemini in general, as they are Air symbols, and have that dual symmetry to them.
But the Gemini 2 decan, associated with the Nine of Swords, called Despair and Cruelty, has had other insect happenings, both good and bad.
In good news, I spotted the first fireflies of the year, which is always a welcome sight!
In bad news, the wet weather which has been otherwise good to my garden, has resulted in a huge number of another yellow and black insects: the dreaded striped cucumber beetle.
They have been very Cruel to my cucumber and squash plants, leading to Despair as some of them aren’t going to make it now, and need to be replanted. They also are getting to the potatoes. Thank god I covered the brassicas, or we would have lost those too.
Some other kind of bugs or maybe birds ate a lot of my bean seedlings. Usually beans are trouble free here. Have to replant some this year.
So in turn, I have been very Cruel to these insects, to the extent that an organic gardener can be Cruel.
Interestingly, that “New yellow leather” color of Gemini in the Prince Scale of the Golden Dawn color scales is the color of the sticky traps or soapy water filled bowls used to try to catch them. I also happened to get a tee shirt in bright yellow, with black lettering, for some reason.
I also have already seen my garden Nemesis, the squash bug, arriving early and hitting on the already beleaguered squash plants. So it goes.
As anticipated, I have spent most of this decan in edit mode, having to be Cruel and CUT many sections from the book I’m working on. I don’t want to cut more, but may have to. At 6×9″ it is around 470 pages of text and 150 pages of tables! No illustrations even. Have to keep cutting, as a book over 600 pages is just too expensive to print as a small publisher.
I’ve also had to make some cruel choices about plants. In addition to gardening, I have a ton of houseplants. Every year at this time I have to make a purge. The plants that are not thriving, or have developed any insect infestation, are moved outdoors. I wash them up, and put them on the deck in a sheltered area. If they recover, they will come back in for the winter. If not, too bad, bye now. So it goes.
Same thing with the garden seedlings I’ve been nurturing all spring. The gardens are full now, so while I will replant the spares for the cucumber and squash plants that got bug-savaged, the rest will have to be sacrificed or given away.
I’m reading a fictional book about Oscar Wilde now. He had quite the way with words, and could be quite cutting. It is a good Gemini 2 coincidence that I picked up the book, because I just now happened to look up his birth chart, thinking that he must have something in this decan, because of his clever, and sometimes cruel, turns of speech. And lo and behold, he has the Gemini 2 decan as his Midheaven, showing what he is known for, with Saturn there to boot, trining his Sun and sextiling his Moon. His quotes live on!
Here are a selection of quotes. The man was witty, so there are so many out there it is hard to choose from.
“She can talk brilliantly on any subject, provided she knows nothing about it.”
“Of course, America had often been discovered before Columbus, but it was always hushed up.”
“Religion is like a blind man looking in a black room for a black cat that isn’t there, and finding it.”
“Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same.”
“I refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed man.”‘
“Patriotism is the virtue of the viscious.”
“Some people know the price of everything, but the value of nothing.”
“Nature: a place where birds fly around uncooked.”
“I never put off till tomorrow what I can do the day after.”
“Conformity is the last refuge of the unimaginative”
“Ridicule is the tribute paid to the genius by the mediocrities.”
“Between the optimist and the pessimist, the difference is droll. The optimist sees the doughnut; the pessimist the hole!”
“The old believe everything, the middle-aged suspect everything, the young know everything.”
“Questions are never indiscreet. Answers sometimes are.”
“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.”