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