I have just heard that the United States is offering $14 million in relief to the devastated region in southeast Asia. I wanted to throw up when I heard the words come out of Colin Powell's mouth. According to the Center for American Progress, the war in Iraq is costing $177 million per day. But I guess a little pocket change is kinder than carpet bombing Sri Lanka.

http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=171440

Monday, 27 December

As the death and damage from yesterday's great wave becomes obvious, I am wondering whether the message is getting across that we in the Western world have much more important things to do with our resources than bomb people.

Nature has come along and dealt a devastating blow to a massive population. And in the past 18 months, the United States and England have deployed hundreds of thousands of troops and nearly a quarter billion dollars making a fraudulent war. Imagine what we could do with all those resources and troops in terms of providing relief to the countries devastated in this disaster.

Imagine what we could do with all the helicopters and ships, medical doctors and nurses, engineers, soldiers and administrators who could be deployed to the devastated region.

This should also be a wakeup call on global warming. We have seen the kind of devastation that can be created in coastal regions by a small, temporary increase in sea level. Multiply that by every coastal region in the world; how, then, would we do with that? How would we deal with that?

Hi Francesco,

I am still eager to see the minor planets; I'll do Riyal and my own list off of ephemeral.info soon. However my training says look for the obvious first -- the winter solstice, the alignment with the GC, the Full Moon, Saturn and Chiron. And I cannot get over the v/c moon just five arc minutes off of the Sept. 11 position, partile. The tight angular Saturn-Chiron, applying -- good heavens.

My friend Pam wrote to me and said, basically, When I look at the chart, I see a lot of Sagittarius, look at the international theme. Watching BBC for 18 hours I kept thinking, well, now the world knows about these places and what happens here. I could see the whole region becoming one vast international 'country'.

The world moves on a woman's hips
The world moves and it swivels and bops
The world moves on a woman's hips
The world moves and it bounces and hops
A world of light...she’s gonna open our eyes up
A world of light...she’s gonna open our eyes up
She’s gonna hold/it move/it hold it/move it hold/it move it hold/
It move it
A world of light...she’s gonna open our eyes up

-- DAVID BYRNE (Capricorn Moon) - from THE GREAT CURVE
(Music by Talking Heads with the feeling of 2 am in a Brazilian discothèque)

-- Eric Francis

In 10 years, will we remember that the day after Christmas 2004, in the midst of the Cancer Full Moon, the most devastating earthquake in decades came on the day that Viktor Yuschenko won the Ukranian election? Without resorting to superstition, is it possible to make a connection between the two events?

Full Moon Earthquake in Southeast Asia, Sunday, Dec. 26, 2004, 6:OO pm CET

By Eric Francis
with BBC reports and reader contributions

Charts at: http://planetwaves.net/astrology/sumatra.html
Data from: US Geological Service http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqinthenews/2004/usslav/

Just before 7 this morning local time, an 8.9 magnitude earthquake hit the west coast of northern Sumatra, an Indonesian island. Coastal regions of Sri Lanka, India, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, the Andaman Islands and the low-lying Maldives Islands were devastated by tsunamis, or powerful waves -- more like walls of water -- generated when earthquakes occur under the ocean floor. Thousands are dead or missing and millions affected. By current reports, the death toll is likely to exceed 10,000. Communication to many areas, particularly the Maldives, is cut off.

The quake was followed by as many as nine aftershocks. Witnesses said the sea receded by a kilometer from the normal coastline before a series of tsunamis, some as high as 10 meters, struck.

A reader just wrote in, quoting Enzo Boschi, the head of Italy's National Geophysics Institute, speaking on on SKY TG 24 TV. "All the planet is vibrating" from the quake, said Boschi, who added that the quake even disturbed the Earth's rotation.

Simply put, the world is a different place after this event.

It is true that we tend to think of events such as earthquakes as local incidents, even though they may affect a wide area. Yet thinking of the world holistically, as one physical object or one living system, it is easy to consider how the whole structure of the planet could be affected -- a condition well portrayed in the nearly exact opposition of Saturn and Chiron that was angular at the moment of the quake (across the 1st and 7th houses, very close to the horizon, please see chart, as well as further discussion below).

Earthquakes are massive releases of energy and tension, often on the scale of thousands of nuclear bombs. They build for years or decades. Given that we are living in extremely tense times on the planet with little relief in sight, and for the most part in ignorance of the fact that we are on a planet that supports us with its own life, both the release of tension and the call to awareness can be put to work for global healing. However, given the scenes of devastation and human suffering throughout what is truly an impoverished region of the world, this is hardly consoling.

Tourist resort areas in high season were among the worst hit. A crowded marketplace, fishing areas, homes, vehicles, cottages, hotels and beaches were washed out to sea with no warning. Most places that were affected had no way of knowing that the waves would hit, because they were too far from the epicenter of the earthquake to even feel it. Musson said that tsunamis can travel five hundred kilometers per hour, so some affected areas were hit by waves hours after the actual quake. This occurred during daylight hours, when many people had flocked to the shore. Many of the worst affected places are extremely isolated and difficult to reach with relief or rescue aid.

In the Maldives, the capital city, Mali, was reported to be two-thirds under water. The Maldives are about one meter above sea level. In Sri Lanka, one of the most devastated areas, BBC is reporting that land mines planted during that country's civil war have been washed out of the ground and are floating on the ocean.

In truth, today's was one of the most massive earthquakes ever recorded, and the second most powerful ever recorded in the Northern Hemisphere. Most of the worst hit areas had never experienced anything vaguely resembling this kind of disaster -- or at least not since 1833.

The tsunamis are believed to have been created by a 1,000 kilometer long rupture in the floor of the Indian Ocean. Roger Musson, a British seismologist interviewed by BBC, said that the displacement, or height difference, between two colliding geological plates beneath the Indian Ocean was as many as 10 to 30 meters. This shift, in turn, displaced vast amounts of water, which in turn created the waves that spread throughout the entire basin as far as 2,000 kilometers across. As these waves reached the shallower water near the shore, the distance between the waves shortened and the height increased as they crashed into the coast.

Today's is being reported as the worst earthquake since the 9.2 magnitude quake that struck Alaska in 1964, and the 5th most powerful since 1900. Musson said that a comparable quake hit the region just south of the current one in 1833, but commented that that nobody remembers it except for a few historians. The Alaskan quake that devastated Anchorage, and was felt as far away as Salt Lake City, Utah, picked up rail cars and threw them hundreds of feet. People were killed by tsunamis as far away as the Oregon coast, where there are still prominent signs warning beachgoers to evacuate the area in the event of a tremor.

The Richter scale, developed in the 1930s, measures the energy of earthquakes. Each whole number value on the scale represents an increase of 31 times the value of the previous whole number increase. The increases are exponential.

Looking at today's chart, one physical factor stands out before any of the symbolic ones: this occurred with the Sun and Moon at nearly full opposition, that is, just before the Full Moon. The Moon's position at the time of the quake was 28 degrees of Gemini and 11 minutes. The Sun's position was 4 degrees of Capricorn and 35 minutes. This is just several hours short of the exact Full Moon. In essence, the Earth was suspended between the Sun and the Moon, creating an intense gravitational pull in either direction.

During the Alaska quake of 1964, there was also a Full Moon, though that quake happened the day after the exact opposition. The Alaska and Sumatra charts are strikingly similar in a number of ways. The Full Moon today occurred exactly -- just over one degree -- on the lunar nodal axis of the Anchorage chart, making the two events virtually inseparable.

However, earthquakes can happen at any time. The infamous May 22, 1960 Chilean earthquake, measuring 8.6 on the Richter scale, occurred just before the New Moon.

In the Sumatra chart, notice as well that the Saturn-Chiron opposition across Cancer and Capricorn is close to the ascendant and the descendent, the two most sensitive angles in a chart; that is, it is looming on the horizon. Saturn in Cancer on the 7th house cusp has the image of a 'wall of water'.

Chiron in aspect to Saturn, particularly on the 90-degree harmonic (square or opposition) presents the energy of Chiron penetrating, unlocking or shifting the nature of the seemintly unmovable structure of Saturn.

In addition, Varuna, a newly discovered planet who is the 'lord of waters', is also in Cancer, and the Part of Fortune is conjunct this planet -- suggesting to me that the loss of life could have been much greater.

The Moon was void of course in the exact degree of the Sept. 11 attacks, in late Gemini. The Moon in the Sept. 11 chart and the Moon in today's earthquake chart were aligned to within five minutes of arc, or less than one-tenth of a degree. This deeply symbolic synchronicity is enough to rate the region of late Gemini as a potential danger zone for major world changes.

This being said, earthquakes are extremely difficult to predict astrologically -- a problem that geologists also face. One of the most reliable factors are the Uranian points, Witte points or Uranians -- hypothetical planets with no physical existence, but whose cycles are nonetheless influential. The most prominent aspect today was a close trine between the Full Moon in Cancer, developing at the time of the earthquake, and the Uranian point Poseidon, another aspect in the chart that says 'great wave'. In addition, the Sun was conjunct the Uranian point Kronos to within about four degrees.

Neither of these would have been reasonable grounds for a prediction of the earthquake or floods. But the exact opposition of Chiron in Capricorn and Saturn in Cancer, which perfects on Dec. 28 could qualify. This opposition moves next to the Leo-Aquarius axis and will again be exact on July 21, 2005.

Later this week, there is an conjunction of Mercury and Venus exactly on the Great Attractor, the same day as the Saturn-Chiron opposition is exact, which involves a direct conjunction with the Moon in Capricorn.

----------------

Reader contributions to updates are welcome. Updates to follow in the blog on http://planetwaves.net/ including information about minor planets as this becomes available, in part based on discussion on the Centaur discussion group.

A Religious Experience -- Early morning, December 25, 2004

Just past midnight on Christmas, I dragged myself out of the house into the wet night and walked over to Notre Dame Cathedral to see what was happening. I walked up Boulevard St. Germain, and then turned up a side street toward the Seine. The cathedral was fully illuminated against the foggy sky. No matter how beautiful it may be, it's still a strange sight to see something that vast and that old standing there in the midst of the modern world. Few buildings I've seen give the impression that they just descended from the sky and landed there; Notre Dame is one.

I remember seeing the thing for the first time, in July, from about a kilometer away on a bridge between Ile St. Louis and the left bank. I had no idea what it was. I just looked at it and thought, man, that's one heavy duty Gothic cathedral. Then some time later it occurred to me what I was looking at.

Tonight, I had no such confusion. I crossed the footbridge to Ile de la Cité, the island where the cathedral is placed, noticing that there were quite a few cops around, though not the antiterrorism brigades armed with machine guns that patrol near the Eiffel Tower. The footbridge leads right to the front of the cathedral, but the entrances were blocked off with metal gates. I asked a young cop on the other side how you get in, and whether you need a ticket. No ticket needed; enter from the far end of the plaza, where I found a metal detector and two guys sort of checking people for guns, acting very leisurely about it. I walked through dangling a large set of keys and a cell phone in my hands; the thing didn't buzz. Yet another security checkpoint that did not exactly inspire confidence. However, I feel more consoled by the fact that France is kind to Muslims than I do by rent-a-cops with metal detectors set too high to detect anything.

It was about 100 meters from there to the entrances; the ushers at the door told me to take off my hat, which I pulled through the hammer loop in my jeans. And I slipped into the huge structure through one of the 25-foot high entrances that were standing wide open, melting into one of those scenes that could have been in any century. The crowd was manageable, busy but not oppressive. Much eye contact all around, intense curious gazes, the lovely, deep eyes of France -- nothing stiff or religious, just purely social. As each pair of eyes met mine, there was a slow-motion feeling as we drew one another out, which felt for a moment like moving through liquid.

Throughout the building there were now flat-screen TV monitors on which the face of the monsignor delivering the mass was visible, a guy giving the impression that he would benefit greatly from resurrection. He seemed older than the Pope. He was in the middle of his sermon, which was scratchy and which I could not comprehend, but I asked someone near me if he had mentioned Iraq. Not that he had heard. (Neither did the Pope, actually; he chose to talk about the need for peace, rather than the problem of war.)

I worked my way around the back, past a sign that said, "No visitors, Service only," and toward the front. I found a good vantage point and at this point, took off my heavy leather jacket and began taking notes. I noticed: wow, I'm inside. I wasn't actually sure I would make it here. This is one way that Paris is different than my home city of New York. In New York City there is no way you're getting into midnight mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral without having a connection to the mayor or bishop personally, or knowing somebody with season tickets -- or that's the impression you get. In Paris, you just walk in the door and there you are.

The sermon ended, and next a cloud of frankincense rose from the altar. Suddenly there were six or eight priests in long white robes gathered around the altar, arms extended, consecrating the host. The scene could have fit a Druid gathering at Stonehenge, and in this setting it seemed no less mystical; that the priests were performing the White Mass was never more apparent. This particular site, long before a church was built there, was an ancient Roman temple to the god Jupiter, whereas Stonehenge is a temple to Mars; it was used, in its day, as a war council chamber. This is built on the scene of some kind of temple to justice and abundance, and then a huge temple to the Virgin followed centuries later.

While this consecration ritual was going on, the organist played something sing-song that could have come from a haunted game show, genuinely strange. I looked around the audience and one woman was conducting with her fingers, with a mocking face. Nobody else seemed to notice. Numerous ushers then appeared with baskets, and I found a 5 euro note in my black reporter's notebook and dropped it in; I've read in the Ninety Five Theses that this is actually a very good idea.

Then out of nowhere came the "Hallelujah Chorus," with the organ ringing at full blast and the choir rising up like angelic thunder. On the TV monitors, you could see the conductor pouring her energy into the minds and eyes of the singers, intense and unselfconscious like an athlete, obviously drawing the best possible performance out of them; but the choir itself, in blue robes, was difficult to see back behind the altar. All combined, it was a moment comparable to my greatest experiences in rock concerts, where my mind could barely take in that I was there or that it was real.

More frankincense -- they love this stuff as much as I do -- this time with the sweet, soft scent of myrrh, the two resins brought by the wise men, along with gold, to the baby Jesus. The wise men, of course, were Zoroastrian priests, 'Magi', that is, astrologers and lore-masters following the omen of a star in the East. If you recall, they returned by a different route, and did not reveal to Herod the location of the Christ child, showing where their true loyalty resided.

I looked around the room, at the vaulted ceilings a full 120 feet above the main aisle. I had no idea but learned later that this church was begun in 1163 and consecrated in 1182, particularly the nave or center aisle -- the part I was standing in. The choir's voices filled up the ancient stone halls, thousands of people in the space listening, and then turning toward the back I could see all the high doors standing wide open into the Paris night, and the big (but really, not so big) Christmas tree outside: a moment of high glory in a place where the Catholic mass has been celebrated for more than 800 years.

Then, "Come All Ye Faithful," which somehow was deeply moving when performed in this setting, at this intensity.

Quietly, ushers with Secret Service-styled walkie-talkies with discreet headsets moved around the room. Then, the alter boys fanned out throughout the cathedral with silver bowls of communion wafers. As the women received the body of Christ from these sweet young virgins, some looked at them with intense, knowing passion; the boys seemed oblivious to their gazes, and they went about their work, placing a small wafer in each of the hands of the faithful. I was not aware that anyone other than a priest could handle the hosts, but I also just saw on BBC an hour earlier that there is an extremely severe shortage of priests in France -- so problematic that the French diocese is importing priests from Africa to help on an emergency basis, and considering allowing its own priests to marry, as was done in centuries past, and has been secret practice in Germany in modern times.

I slipped closer to the front, getting as close as I could get. I found a seat in about the 20th row, on the aisle. The choir was now singing Les Anges dans nos campagnes, a traditional French Christmas carol which was long ago translated into English as "Angels We Have Heard On High." I truly wished my Aunt Josie could have been there.

The mass was about to end.

From outside, as if far in the distance but really high in the two east-facing towers, one could hear the sounds of the ancient bells clanging low and dissonant, announcing the birth of Christ. I pictured Quasimodo up there, personally ringing them.

Now ushers and security guys moved efficiently through the main aisle, clearing the way and scooting people back into their rows. Then the procession began: first with half a dozen altar boys carrying candles on long poles, with one, a solemn looking black boy at the center, holding the crucifix; then the priests; and then the elderly monsignor who was offering the mass. He seemed like a happy guy, accepting greetings from the crowd and looking back from deep within himself through his humorous, attentive eyes. On his head, he was wearing a small, Madonna-like microphone and headset device. I flashed him a peace sign.

Then came the choir members, in their blue robes: at first it seemed to be a children's choir, there were about 30 or more people considerably younger than 18 -- they have those high, energized voices -- then they were followed by the taller ones, about as many adults. This was not a professional choir of any kind, but rather an extremely dedicated group of volunteers who obviously practiced quite a bit.

As they passed, the crowd streamed into the aisle and followed, and I moved with them for a while, then at the first opportunity cut to the right and wormed my way along the north side of the cathedral, toward the great doors, replacing my jacket and hat, and streaming out and into the soft Paris mist.

I walked home along the river, looking across the river at the ancient high-Gothic structure with its massive flying buttresses spread out around the building supporting those 10-story high walls, and its great black lead spire reaching high into the night.


--------------------------

Notes

Notre Dame Cathedral is the geographic center of Paris. Just outside its doors is a brass plaque embedded in the concrete which is the beginning of 'kilometer zero'. It is on Ile de la Cite, which is the first place that a civilization emerged in the city of Paris thousands of years ago. An archeological crypt below the the main courtyard contains ruins that date from between the 2nd century CE (AD) and the 19th century CE (AD).

http://www.oldandsold.com/articles05/cathedral8.shtml writes:

"Begun in 1163 and consecrated in 1182, the church has undergone many vicissitudes, changes, and restorations. It has fared ill on many occasions; perhaps the greatest defilement being that which befell it during the Revolution, when it was not only foully desecrated, its statues and other imagery despoiled, but the edifice was actually doomed to destruction."

http://www.discoverfrance.net/France/Cathedrals/Paris/Notre-Dame.shtml writes:

"The Gothic loftiness of Notre-Dame dominates the Seine and the Ile-de-la-Cité as well as the history of Paris. On the spot where this majestic cathedral now stands, the Romans had built a temple to Jupiter, which was followed by a Christian basilica and then a Romanesque church (the Cathedral of St. Etienne, founded by Childebert in 528).

"Maurice de Sully, bishop of Paris, decided to build a new cathedral for the expanding population, dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Although construction started in 1163, it was not completed until roughly 180 years later in about 1345. Built in an age of illiteracy, the cathedral retells the stories of the Bible in its portals, paintings, and stained glass.

"On completion of the choir in 1183, work was begun on the nave and completed c.1208, followed by the west front and towers c.1225-1250. A series of chapels were added to the nave during the period 1235-50, and to the apse during 1296-1330 (Pierre de Chelles and Jean Ravy). Transept crossings were built in 1250-67 by Jean de Chelles and Pierre de Montreuil (also the architect of the Sainte-Chapelle). The six-part rib vaults and the thin elements articulating the wall are typically Early Gothic."

http://web.kyoto-inet.or.jp/org/orion/eng/hst/gothic/bourges.html
Nave is 15m width and 37m height

Small wheel turns by the fire and rod
Big wheel turns by the grace of God
Every time that wheel goes round
You're bound to cover just a little more ground.

-- The Grateful Dead

English Lesson

Tonight I was hanging out with some Tunisian guys. Knowing I would be seeing them, I came up in advance with my big funny line, hoping I could deliver it with some conviction. I had my moment.

"I just have one question."

"What?"

"Where the fuck is Tunisia?"

It worked. They thought that was hilarious. Americans have an odd habit of not knowing where anyplace actually is, and these guys are also very entertained by my profanity. The beauty of cussing in English in France is that it's not nearly as actually vulgar or offensive here; it's more entertaining and expressive.

It turns out that Tunisia is a north African country near Egypt and Morocco.

"So you guys are African-American?"

I am my friend Mourad's unofficial English teacher. He speaks five languages including Arabic, and his English is far better than my French; he actually can conjugate verbs. This is the big stumbling block for people learning any language. Anyone can say "apple." But you have to be really smart to say, "I would not have wanted that apple." That damn sentence is fully 85% verb! I believe that's in the past imperfect conditional tense. I hope to be able to say that in French by age 45.

Anyway, he wants English practice. So I'm teaching him all the things you would never learn in school, like tonight's vocabulary word, schleppy.

His family owns a grocery store, which he has the honor of watching till midnight tonight -- I think he's the only thing open for business besides restaurants, six taxicabs and the hospital. We are in the heart of Paris, where a pack of four Gillette 'Mach 3' razor blades costs 10 euros (that's about $13 as of this writing; somewhat more tomorrow). But for the most part, it's really quiet.

A customer walks in, selects some items off the shelves, and places them on the counter. They are large, clear bottles, full of white powder.

I say in one of my mock-American accents, "What's that, snow?"

Not thinking this is the funniest thing he's heard all week, he answers in English that it's powdered sugar, for cake frosting; family project.

After he leaves, Mourad asks me if he's American. I say yes, American, East Coast.

"How can you tell?"

"Well the way he dresses, a little proper, vest sweater, his accent, he's a bit schleppy, you know, you can just tell."

So now I have to explain that schleppy is from Yiddish, an old language like German, and I do my scheleppy guy imitation so he gets the idea.

Yesterday, I was going over how you say, "Whatchadoin?" in heavy Brooklyn street talk, which is lazy, sleazy, arrogant, tough and friendly all at the same time. He was having trouble with the exact inflection, but I think he'll get it with some practice.

Christmas Eve, 2004

Good evening from Paris. I would like to wish you a happy holiday, whatever one it is for you, or just a good Sabbath.

Here's a little astrology update. The Christmas holiday this year falls in the approach to the Full Moon, which is exact the afternoon of Dec. 26 in Europe, morning in the United States.

This is the Cancer Full Moon -- full in her own sign.

By that time, Mars, Venus, Mercury and Pluto will all be in Sagittarius; Mars is changing signs now, an obvious source of anticipation, tension and transitional energy associated with the approaching lunation.

Venus and Mercury are gathering around the Great Attractor in mid Sagittarius. These are very personal planets hanging around a very, very large piece of the sky, a point that exists over yonder the other side of our galaxy, far far away, so massive that, well, you've probably read it before.

The true lunar modes also change signs this weekend, retrograding from late Taurus/Scorpio to early Aries/Libra (the average direction of the nodes is always retrograde).

So that's a lot of change all at once, which promises excitement, fun, edginess and/or a quality of dancing on the edge for everyone.

Try not to take your life too seriously; don't worry, I'm only saying that because I need the reminder, and this chart I'm looking at comes equipped with a lot of exaggeration of feelings, but also heightened awareness and, in the tradition of the season, gifts and revelations.

Catch you soon. Thanks for tuning in.

Paris, Weds. Dec. 22, 2004

Well, things, as in life and the cosmos, does seem to have settled down a little since Mercury stationed direct and the Sun changed signs to Capricorn. It has been a totally insane year, speaking astrologically and many other ways. The pace has been picking up steadily since the Venus retrograde in May. That's a long time; since then it's been one factor after another creating a situation of relentless movement, change, chaos and hopefully progress. It's unlikely everyone agrees on that last point, but the chances are you'll find it if you look.

These days, I'm working to wind down for as much of a year-end break as I can get doing weekly projects -- but I do have a scheme I'm cooking up and will be putting my work into low-energy mode the last week of the year. The one project I do have to wrap up is the last rewrite of the 2005 annual horoscope.

I'm likely to post the short version to the web page and post the extended version to subscribers, who will in any event see it first. While subscriptions are $54.95 a year, we don't turn anyone away for lack of funds -- all you have to do is ask, and we comp you for three months. This is our long-standing business policy. So whether you'd like us to swipe your credit card or not, you're welcome to get on the Planet Waves Weekly mailing list.

What else? I dunno. I need to get my wet laundry over to the laundromat, give the Q & A column one last going over, and with any luck have a mellow night.

Tomorrow, I'll be doing the Planet Waves essay on finding the ideal career, part two. This will be a detailed essay on the 6th and 10th houses, which will explore the two major modes of work-related activity and offer suggestions for how to get both of those houses going, clear and running well.

I'll catch you soon, and if there's anyone who's requested a copy of the "Book of Jobs" essay and has not received it, please drop me another note, at francis@planetwaves.net

Blessings,

    e

Paris, Monday, Dec. 20, 2004

Good morning America, good evening Europe. I realized yesterday how long of a break I've taken from this page -- as I keep working in the background and, finally, take some good weekends off. The months leading into the election were an ever-escalating experience of pure madness, and whatever may be ahead in the world of politics, I'm happy that all at least is over. We have yet to see the very most interesting developments, which will begin to coalesce around the time of the inauguration and for the nine months after.

I promised an interpretation of the Greek hostage situation chart -- I'll see about getting the chart onto the WWW and then take the interpretation from there. It's interesting, and it's nice to see what a chart that has a positive outcome looks like. There have been too many charts lately where it just looked like one thing worse than the next was developing out of Washington or Baghdad.

As for what's cooking at Planet Waves -- this afternoon I finished the last weekly horoscope for 2004. Incredible, really. This year, I wrote about 75 weekly horoscopes (PW was twice weekly for a while, about 50 monthly horoscopes, and about 10 daily horoscopes for Jonathan Cainer in the Daily Mirror. The horoscope gets more and more fun to write, and feels more natural each time I do it. Come April, we'll be at the 10th anniversary of my horoscope writing career, which began with a column called The Navigator in a paper called FreeTime in New York.

Anyway -- enough career nostalgia -- I'm now into a Friday series on finding your way into fulfilling and satisfying work. Last week, I told a few personal stories, talked about Sagittarius and Capricorn, and proposed some journaling exercises designed to put people back in touch with their core reality. I got more positive response to this essay than anything I've written all year. It seems like people are really getting the desire to do their right livelihood good and strong. When we were younger and less jaded, we knew what that was. Little kids know what they love! And adults need to go back to those little kids inside themselves and find that space of being where work is play and play is work.

In other words, we all need to do a little reverse growing and backtrack to where we're not bored and where time is fulfilling, not just something we endure. I'll have more in this series on Friday for Planet Waves subscribers, though anyone who writes to me can have a copy of the essay, "Beyond the Book of Jobs" with the Friday weekly horoscope.

Drop that note to francis@planetwaves.net

Have a safe and sane solstice -- remember, the Sun is now in the midst of changing signs, always a mystery moment, and Mercury has stationed to direct motion but still may be playing some tricks.

love from Paris,

    e

Heyo, I'm pleasantly swamped in writing work the next couple of days, so it's likely I won't be blogging; but who knows, maybe tomorrow. I'm watching the astrology of the Greek hostage situation carefully. It does not look like it's headed for a showdown, but let's keep that bus with the light around it, and pray that the people planning the rescue, likely to be at Athens Airport, are good chess players. Back to you soon on this one. Before I log off for the night, I would like to dedicate this next article from The Onion to astrology and therapy clients everywhere. Sometimes it turns out to be nothing, and nothing was a big deal anyway. The Onion is one of the most psychologically astute publications I've ever read; their humor is based almost entirely on the mentality of people, or rather, of Americans. While you're there, don't miss the "Spawn of Santa" article. It's way long, it's silly, but we all know Jean Teasdale and her dad, and it's worth the read; but that's me talking. -- love, e

http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4050&n=3

Planet Waves, Paris, Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2004

Nearly 1,300 U.S. soldiers have been killed since the war began. Many thousands more have been wounded. Last week the New England Journal of Medicine reported that the US is facing a "severe shortage of surgeons in Iraq" to treat wounded soldiers. It is now estimated that more soldiers have been injured in Iraq than during the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, or the first five years of the Vietnam conflict.

And in what appears to be a chilling echo of the Vietnam war, UPI found that homeless shelters around the country are reporting they are already seeing some recently returned Iraq veterans showing up in need of shelter. The Homeless Veterans coalition estimates that nearly 500,000 veterans are homeless at some point in a given year. Almost half served during the Vietnam era.

This is an interview with Mark Benjamin, UPI Investigations editor. He has been closely following the hidden U.S. casualties from the Iraq war. He was awarded the American Legion's top journalism award for 2004 for his reporting on the plight of hundreds of sick, wounded and injured soldiers at Fort Stewart, Ga. The interview is conducted by Amy Goodman at WBAI Radio in Manhattan for the program Democracy Now. Amy is a trusted colleague.

AMY GOODMAN: Mark Benjamin is U.P.I.'s Investigations editor. He has been closely following the hidden U.S. casualties from the Iraq war. He was awarded the American Legion's top journalism prize for 2004 for his reporting on the plight of hundreds of sick, wounded and injured soldiers, and one particular base at Ft. Stewart, Georgia. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Mark Benjamin.

MARK BENJAMIN: Thank you for having me.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about this piece that you wrote on the number of homeless veterans of the Iraq invasion.

MARK BENJAMIN: Yes. Homeless veterans from Iraq are just starting to show up at some homeless shelters in the country. I found 60 -- 50 of them have been in touch with the veteran's administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs. I found another 10 at a group of homeless shelters in Los Angeles called U.S. Vets. The thing that's most disturbing, I think, about the story is that most of the people that are professionals in this area, meaning advocates for homeless veterans are very disturbed that the people are showing up already. The other very disturbing trend is that there is a correlation between mental problems and homelessness, and the number of troops coming home from this war with mental problems is quite shocking.

AMY GOODMAN: You talk about the mental problems. Like what?

MARK BENJAMIN: Well, in general, it looks like what they call post-traumatic stress disorder. They used to call it shell shock in previous wars. Army reported in the New England journal of medicine that 17% of all of the soldiers who are just stepping off the plane would screen positive for post traumatic stress disorder and this is a problem that pops up weeks or months after serving in combat. According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, around -- as of last July, 30,000 soldiers from Iraq had shown up at Department of Veterans Affairs health care facilities, and one out of every five has been diagnosed with some sort of a mental problem. So, the rate -- these are people that, of course, were screened as fit for service. There's clearly something happening. If you talk to the soldiers, what you will find is that it is extremely tense and stressful combat. The enemy is 24/7, 360 degrees. It's really very intense kind of combat. There's often confusion between civilian and enemy combatant. It is just the combat that the soldiers say causes -- and experts say causes serious mental problems.

AMY GOODMAN: And then what about the hidden casualties in addition to mental health problems? It's a story that you have continued to cover that gets almost no coverage. We hear several thousand soldiers have been wounded, but your figures are much higher than that.

MARK BENJAMIN: Well, the Pentagon is not counting in its casualties anyone who is not hit by the bullets or bombs of the enemy. And they're now, you know, releasing some of these figures. It's around, I believe, 15,000, just from Iraq, solders who are been medivacked out of Iraq for wounds or illnesses that occurred while in Iraq, but none of those soldiers appear on the Pentagon's casualty lists, even though they were often hurt in serving their trucks roll over, a car accident, that kind of a thing. In fact, we were talking here about mental problems, about 17% of soldiers who have possibly post traumatic stress disorder, even soldiers who are medivacked out of Iraq because they have had serious mental problem, they had to be medivacked, none of those soldiers appear on Pentagon casualty lists.

AMY GOODMAN: There's a piece in the Boston Globe from last week by Raja Mishra. It says U.S. troops injured in Iraq have required limb amputations at twice the rate of past wars and as many as 20% have suffered head and neck injuries that require a lifetime of care. The picture is a grisly flipside improvement of battlefield medicine that has saved many combatants who have died in the past. Only one in ten U.S. troops injured in Iraq has died, the lowest rate of any war in U.S. history. Those who survive have much more grievous wounds.

MARK BENJAMIN: Well, I think that's probably true. It is the flip side. I mean, in the Pentagon's defense, they do a really fabulous job, almost -- almost shocking how good they are, at getting to the soldiers when they are severely injured, for example, by I.E.D.s, the explosive devices in the field. If you talk to the soldiers, they will say if you make it to Landstuhl, the hospital that the military runs in Germany, if you make it there, you're going to live. They get you out of Iraq very, very fast. I would just have to say, in contrast to that, my reporting seemed to indicate that there are other types of injuries that the military is not doing such a good job treating. One of those would be mental problems. I keep bringing that up, because it's such a shocking pattern among soldiers returning. I think that many of those soldiers would say that they do not get the care that they want and deserve.

AMY GOODMAN: Finally, another report out this is from The Los Angeles Times that also came out last week about the shortage of surgeons to treat the wounded in Iraq. Army has fewer than 65 surgeons at any one time, to cover 138,000 troops. They're reporting on a piece from Atul Gawande, assistant professor at the Harvard School of Public Health who talks about those physicians there that are there -- and the military wants to bring more back -- are working under very difficult circumstances. In many case, the military has taken over Iraqi hospitals. The facilities are flooded with civilian patients whom the Americans are unable to treat with no clear directive from the Pentagon on treating civilians. Some physicians refuse to help even pediatric patients out of fear that the children could be booby trapped with bombs.

MARK BENJAMIN: Yeah. I don't know whether these -- I of course, didn't report these stories. I'm sure they're perfectly accurate. One of the things that I do think they are is a reflection of a reality that is finally, I think, becoming very clear in the press, and that is just the size and the scope of this war. I mean, it may sound obvious to some people and not to others. I mean, I did a story last week on the number of troops, I got Pentagon data on the number of troops that are deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq since the conflicts began, it and it was just short of 1 million troops, 1 million troop, had been deployed either to "Operation Iraqi Freedom" or "Operation Enduring Freedom." 300,000 troops had been deployed more than once to one of the places. We are in a really, really, big war. And what that means is anybody knows the military knows, there are only about 1.4 million active duty people wearing uniforms anywhere in the world, and about half of the number -- I know I'm mixing up the numbers a little bit, but 700,000 of the million I just referred to, are active duty troops. What I'm getting at is that we have now gone through half of the Army. I'm sorry; half the military completely has gone to war.

AMY GOODMAN: Mark Benjamin, on that note I want to thank you very much for being with us. He is U.P.I. Investigations editor.

I'm gonna let Tom Toles, once of Buffalo, now in Washington at the Post, do all the blogging we could possibly need tonight.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=index2&cid=1072

Paris, Dec. 12, 2004


Dear Readers, Cousins and Friends:

We've updated the homepages with Friday's essay, Revolution of the Willing. We're using a graphic of a galaxy to illustrate the article as this week, the Earth and Sun align with the core of the Milky Way galaxy. This happens once a year, when the Sun is in late Sagittarius.

Two revelations showed up with this morning's Sagittarius New Moon conjunct Pluto and Arachne, each chilling in its implications and inviting the sane and loving people of the world to stay awake, alert and faithful in the midst of so much change and turmoil.

The first was news that Victor Yuschenko, the opposition leader and presidential candidate in the Ukraine, was intentionally poisoned with dioxin in September. This accounts for the severe disfigurement of his face, a condition called chloracne, which was discovered by electrical equipment manufacturers in the United States, including General Electric. In 1937, Harvard scientist Cecil K Drinker determined that chrloracne was not the result of skin irritation but rather of systemic poisoning that was killing the livers of the workers.

The other story is that paramedics who attended to Dr. David Kelly, the weapons expert who spoke out against the war in Iraq, and who was found in the woods early last year in what was claimed to be a suicide, say that based on the crime scene Kelly could not possibly have killed himself.

Planet Waves coverage of that issue is here:

http://www.ericfrancis.com/issues/0308/kelly_astro.html

Back to the dioxin situation, I spent part of the evening last night corresponding with Carol van Strum, the Oregon-based author and activist who taught me this issue (related to my work on PCBs). Here is what she wrote to me. Compare what she has said to newspaper and Internet accounts of Yuschenko's poisoning. Dioxin is known in the scientific community as TCDD, or tetrachlorinated dibenzo-para-dioxin. It is the most toxic chemical substance known, close to plutonium in its power to cause or accelerate cancer and many other diseases.

"The part of the story that I find most bizarre is the claim that within a few weeks of supposedly massive exposure, Yuschenko's levels were back to 'normal'. With TCDD, this is inconceivable.  Vietnam veterans who were exposed decades ago still have elevated, toxic levels of TCDD in their tissues, ditto for those exposed at Seveso and every other industrial accident to sudden, massive doses; this stuff doesn't go away, it isn't excreted, it lodges in lipids in blood, cells, and tissue and is not broken down by any known process; i.e., there is no antidote, and the body does not process it.

"So how could someone with 1000 times some unknown "background" level of TCDD in their system suddenly within weeks have almost none? It doesn't compute, and this is the part of the story that casts doubt on all of it. There's no question looking at the photos that his face mirrors exactly the grotesque photos of Nitro workers and other massive exposures, and since TCDD is odorless and colorless, it's possible to administer it without someone knowing.  But that raises other huge questions -- why dioxin?  It's not a poison that kills quickly, for one thing; so was it not so much an attempt to kill as a cruel way to disfigure and degrade a handsome, apparently vibrant person? And another question: where did the dioxin come from?  It is not a substance you can produce in the kitchen, it requires sophisticated laboratory equipment and extremely competent chemists to isolate it.  

"I'd like to know Arnold Schecter's response to this; I suspect he'd say there's no way to judge without a lot more data. Meanwhile, I just hope to god Mr. Y. & his wife aren't intending to have any children."

Schecter was the truth-obsessed health commissioner in Broome County, New York, who dealt with the dioxin-tainted Binghamgon State Office Building -- the 1981 precursor to the disaster 100 miles away in New Paltz, New York.

For more on chloracne, see these two links:

Dioxin Critic Sued
http://www.planetwaves.net/dioxin_critic.html

Conspiracy of Silence
http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/200103/conspiracy.asp

Paris, Dec. 11, 2004, 2:14 pm

Greetings, cousins and friends.

I am doing well, apologies for dropping off of this page for a few days. I got myself fully immersed in the annual horoscope, then the Cainer page, then the Friday essay. I'll post a sample here, and we'll have the whole thing for you later in the weekend.

It's called Revolution of the Willing, and begins with a discussion of Iraq. Begin quote:

The question is: how long can we see the picture before going into denial? And: why pay attention at all? Once the question gets to that level, we are in territory that can truly be called 'spiritual', if that word is vaguely meaningful.

If we're talking spiritual, we could also be inquiring about the karmic effects of this situation. Karma is the law under which every action we take has consequences; it is the law of cause and effect. Simply, actions set consequences into motion. We often experience the effects of our creations. What is a creation? Something we do; but the lack of action, or lack of awareness where we should have it, count. There is an Arab parable wherein those karma-creating gestures can be as meager as throwing date pits around after you've eaten the fruit. I am certain that there is a large segment of the U.S. population, sufficiently versed in the holy books, well practiced in yoga, trained in healing, or and generally in touch with reality, to understands this equation.

There's another law, said to be a higher law, called the Law of Grace, which can transcend karma. Grace is to karma what quantum physics is to Newtonian physics. It is a higher order of reality. In much the same way as science is struggling to catch up, most people refuse to accept its implications. My understanding of the Law of Grace is that it's not about denial as we think of it, but rather about awareness, honest acknowledgement and asking for intervention. In Christian terms, you can receive the grace of God's forgiveness once you acknowledge your sins. The verbs are 'acknowledge' and 'receive'.

Anyone can do this, but someone has to actually make the request. Often it is not so easy, or we 'forget', and much of what can stand in the way is the unwillingness of people to be relieved of their burdens, the belief that it's not possible, or faith in their own unworthiness, which is powerful. So in healing, the asking and receiving have to work on those levels too. (I am also aware that the Catholics make the matter even more complicated by requiring that an ordained priest be involved in absolution, but I have not found this to be necessary. Mother Theresa and my Aunt Josie were not ordained priests.)

In less orthodox terms, it does often take a healer to assist in the process of healing. Yet most healers will tell you that what they do is love unconditionally within the healing process, and ask for the help of the Holy Spirit. Most would agree that the receiving of healing must be a conscious act by a person willingly seeking it. It is a kind of revolution of the willing.

"I do not believe the wicked always win. I believe our despair is a lie
we are telling ourselves. In many other periods of history, people,
ordinary citizens, routinely set aside hours, days, time in their lives
for doing the work of politics, some of which is glam and revolutionary
and some of which is dull and electoral and tedious and not especially
pure--and the world changed because of the work they did. That's what
we're starting now. It requires setting aside the time to do it, and
then doing it. Not any single one of us has to or possibly can save the
world, but together in some sort of concert, in even
not-especially-coordinated concert, with all of us working where we see
work to be done, the world will change. And we have to do it by showing
up places, our bodies in places, turn off the fucking computers, leave
the Web and the 'Net--and show up, our bodies at meetings and demos and
rallies and leafleting corners.

"Because this is a moment in history that needs us to begin, each of us
every day at her or his own pace, slowly and surely rediscovering how to
be politically active, how to organize our disparate energies into
effective group action--and I choose to believe we will do what is
required. Act. Organize. Assemble. Oppose. Resist. Find a place a cause
a group a friend and start, today, now now now, continue continue
continue. Being politically active is for the citizens of a democracy
maybe the best way of speaking to God and hearing Her answer: You exist.
If we are active, if we are activist, She replies to us: You
specifically exist. Mazel tov. Now get busy, She replies. Maintain the
world by changing the world."

--Tony Kushner
from "Despair Is A Lie We Tell Ourselves"
December 08, 2004
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/despair_is_a_lie_we_tell_ourselves.php

While I'm scrounging around the Internet looking for things to steal from Michael Jackson, who owns publishing to the whole Lennon-McCartney catalog, thanks to a gaffe by Paul in the 1980s -- he thought he could trust Jacko with the little fact that the portfolio was up for bid, and Michael promptly reached into his deep pockets and purchased it -- the day would not be complete without Strawberry Fields Forever.

(In case you're wondering why Beatles songs are ending up on TV commercials, now you know. And hey, the money pays...lawyers!)

Here's a little story, really an observation. I was watching a video documentary about the Beatles first visit to the United States, in 1964. There is a great scene in the hotel, with Brian Epstein working the phone, his buxom, womanly secretaries gorgeous in that particularly Sixties way running around the suite taking care of this and that and handing him things to sign, and the boys, in their suits, are hanging around doing their thing.

In John's case it was sitting on the couch playing the Melodian, a little keyboard of about two octaves that you blow into. I recognized the music...he was playing the opening chords to Strawberry Fields Forever! The discographies seem to agree was recorded more than two-and-a-half years later, in late November and early December 1966. That doesn't seem so long now, but remember that when the boys played Shea Stadium on that New York visit, they were doing Twist and Shout and She Loves You, and the little girls were fainting in the aisles in the sweltering haze of their own estrogen.

Strawberry Fields -- I learn -- was conceived from a Salvation Army orphanage in Woolton named Strawberry Field, a short distance from where Lennon grew up. This song is one of John's most complex and personal pieces of songwriting, the very most ultimate example of psychedelic music, and a listening experience that can be so transcendent it's really not possible to describe. Particularly on one toke of grass. Good gods.

Strawberry Fields is now a memorial to John on the western edge of Central Park at 72nd Street, across from the Dakota Building. If you have it, play it loud, you never remembered it this good. John, John, John, thank you. There's lots of us in your tree.


 Let me take you down, 'cos I'm going to Strawberry Fields
 Nothing is real, and nothing to get hungabout
 Strawberry Fields forever

 Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see
 It's getting hard to be someone but it all works out, it doesn't matter much to me
 Let me take you down, 'cos I'm going to Strawberry Fields
 Nothing is real, and nothing to get hungabout
 Strawberry Fields forever

 No one I think is in my tree, I mean it must be high or low
 That is you can't you know tune in but it's all right, that is I think it's not too bad

 Let me take you down, 'cos I'm going to Strawberry Fields
 Nothing is real, and nothing to get hungabout
 Strawberry Fields forever

 Always, no sometimes, think it's me, but you know I know when it's a dream
 I think I know I mean a "Yes" but it's all wrong, that is I think I disagree

 Let me take you down, 'cos I'm going to Strawberry Fields
 Nothing is real, and nothing to get hungabout
 Strawberry Fields forever
 Strawberry Fields forever
 Strawberry Fields forever

FAME was co-written and performed by David Bowie and John Lennon in 1975.

"John Lennon helped write this. Bowie invited him to the studio, and Lennon played rhythm guitar on a jam session that resulted in this. Bowie met Lennon less than a year earlier, at a party thrown by Elizabeth Taylor. Lennon was one of Bowie's idols, and they became good friends. Bowie often had conversations with Lennon about how fame took away parts of their lives. Lennon came up with the title. At first, he was saying something like "Aim," but then he muttered "Fame," and Bowie wrote the lyrics around it." -- assembled from Songfacts

Fame, makes a man take things over
Fame, lets him loose, hard to swallow
Fame, puts you there where things are hollow
Fame

Fame, it's not your brain, it's just the flame
That burns your change to keep you insane
Fame

Fame, what you like is in the limo
Fame, what you get is no tomorrow
Fame, what you need you have to borrow
Fame

Fame, "Nien! It's mine!" is just his line
To bind your time, it drives you to, crime
Fame

Could it be the best, could it be?
Really be, really, babe?
Could it be, my babe, could it, babe?
Really, really?

Is it any wonder I reject you first?
Fame, fame, fame, fame
Is it any wonder you are too cool to fool
Fame

Fame, bully for you, chilly for me
Got to get a rain check on pain
Fame

Fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame
Fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame, fame
Fame, fame, fame

Fame
What's your name?

Paris, Monday, Dec. 6, 2004

While I sit here trying to figure out what to say about John Lennon tonight, slowly realizing I have nothing to say except that I wish he was alive, and to remind everyone that it's easier to destroy than it is to create, and that it seems like yesterday that I was listening to Double Fantasy for the first time, and that every time my dad and brother and I drove past the Dakota Building on Central Park West all through the 70s he seemed in an odd way like our neighbor (we lived 25 blocks uptown and two blocks over; his Zip code was 10024 and ours was 10025, but we drove past his building hundreds of times, oh, and the other tenants wouldn't let the Nixons live there), I want to point out a new article that's been added to the cover -- called Battlefield Earth.

It's actually an acceptance speech for an award given to Bill Moyers, the Public Television investigative journalist, and it sums up something I've been trying to get at for a long time far better than I could have. That is, the relationship between The Rapture and the environment.

The Rapture is a social phenomenon that has gripped a large segment of the United States population, based on the idea that these are the End Times and that The End is near and any time now, we're going to see the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse riding down Broadway. The environment is the thing that needs our attention now, particularly as the world heats up and the ice caps melt, watering down the salinity of the oceans and threatening the Gulf Stream, and it's less-frequently-mentioned Pacific Ocean counterpart. These two currents are what keep the northern hemisphere as warm as it is -- among other things. But because the government is now essentially controlled by Rapture Christians and Rapture Christians think that it's a good thing that the world is "ending," there is nobody at the helm of Spaceship Earth and things are getting very weird on the planet: the storms, strange weather patterns, and the locusts sweeping the Israel and parts of Africa and so on.

And if you have at any point thought it was a little odd that people are hurling bombs and gunpowder and throwing gasoline on the fire that is the Middle East...which could obviously cause some big problems...for like no good reason at all...maybe it's, well, intentional?

But of course I feel like something of a jerk for talking about this because a) what can I do, and b) what can you do, and c) we really just want to go out and have a good time, right? Though actually I don't feel like such a jerk because, for what it's worth, Bill Moyers has made it very clear why we should care, even if he doesn't actually give any hints as to what to do about it; but obviously we should do what we can, or a little more than we can, and the first thing we can do is to acknowledge what is going on and talk to someone about it. See, I'm doing my part! You're reading this.

The problem with what's going on in these days and years of our lives is precisely how unbelievable it is. The other problem is that we have become so stressed out trying to get through the day -- so many people are working three jobs, trying to feed their kids, deal with school, deal with the ex and so on -- that can we really, you know, think about the social changes that are leading to the political community more or less committing to ecological suicide to please their Rapture constituency?

What the fuck did I just say?

Well, read Bill's article if you dare.

John, I don't know what to say except I love you.

Paris, Sunday, Dec. 5, 2004


Dear Friends and Readers:

I'm going to take a couple of days of the weblog to reflect some on John Lennon. The 24th anniversary of his murder is Tuesday.

Please keep your submissions coming, and don't worry if you haven't seen yours posted yet. If it goes more than a week, send me a little prod, no worries.

Twenty-four years later, it's still so hard to accept what happened. I remember looking over the front page of the New York Times the next morning before school and missing the page one story, which was hastily stripped into the center of the page at the last moment before press time. I had to hear about it on the bus from first 'neocon' I ever met, a junior named Adam Kidan.

It's even stranger given today that many people don't quite realize who John Lennon was. I have a friend back on Vashon Island, in his mid-30s, a composer and musician, who had never heard the Abbey Road album! So that tells you about the possible knowledge gap among those in the next couple of generations with much less interest in music and its history.

The Beatles opened up another dimension of reality, both musically and emotionally. Much of what became rock music for the next 30 years simply borrows from or expands upon the database of sounds, lyrical advances, album art and thematic content that they pioneered. But their contribution was so much greater. The 1960s were a deeply painful, unsettled and violent period in the history of the Western world. The Beatles provided much of the soundtrack, reminding us that there is a world within, that peace is attainable, that you can speak your mind, and that you can change the world, if just a little.

They did something else that was quite unusual: they changed very quickly. One thing you can say about the 1960s is that the whole experience went by very rapidly and by all accounts, it was impossible to keep a grip on what was happening. With each new record, the Beatles were someone else, but they were still the Beatles. This challenged people to grow, and it gave them permission to change and become and not cling to what they were yesterday.

While they were each responsible for co-creating the transformation that surrounded them, John was the hot, raging, creative and political engine at the core of the group. There are no accounts of his life that fail to portray him as a deeply conflicted, drug-addicted person, but through those shadows there radiates the light of something we know is real by how deeply it has touched us, and continues to do so.

John's haunting and magnificent voice still rings like fire, burning away the mists of confusion in the world. If you want a real treat, find a commercial Beatles DVD anthology in a video shop and watch him perform the final take of All You Need is Love, which was broadcast on worldwide television. The Beatles were selected to represent the United Kingdom on the first-ever global satellite hook-up television program, and that was the song they chose.

The quartet (performing in their Sgt. Peppers suits that must have weighed 50 pounds) is surrounded in the studio by a large chorus, which includes Mick Jagger sitting on the floor, clapping his hands and singing along between the stanzas. The full orchestra performs every note live, with tens of millions of people watching. It is quite unbelievable.

All you need is love.

So where did that one go? They are trying to get us to believe that all you need is war. Am I tripping or is that the message? Oh, right, all you need is stuff. And that would be seen as both believable and perfectly stupid, were it not for the state of panic that is settling in over much of the planet. Yet most of the resources that could go for food, water, medicine and books are going to create chaos.

John is gone, so it's up to us to speak out, to challenge ourselves to get real, and to turn the pain and crisis we experience into beauty and inspiration. If we can only do one thing right (and for John, it was be a rock star), we need to get that one thing right and do it with every cell in our bodies.

Here's my earlier piece, called Whatever Gets You to the Light.

http://planetwaves.net/whatever.html

Here is something I just found in Google, an interview with both of John's wives.

http://articles.absoluteelsewhere.net/Articles/2_mrs_lennons.html

Here's a bit about what it means to be born in the Sixties.

http://www.ericfrancis.com/planetwaves/sixties.html

Catch you tomorrow.

love

    e

Dear Readers: We have updated the monthly horoscopes, however to get them you will need to go to our European mirror server, which is at http://planetwaves.info. We're having a technical issue with the US server that will be resolved later in the day. This has nothing to do with Mercury being retrograde, however, that is merely a strange and unpredictable coincidence.