Tues. Aug. 30, 2022: That New Moon in Virgo Energy

Tuesday, August 30, 2022
Waxing Moon
Pluto, Saturn, Neptune, Chiron, Jupiter, Uranus Retrograde
Sunny and humid
This will be short, partly because there isn’t much to say about the weekend, and partly because today is overly busy.
Most of the weekend was spent getting the apartment ready for the inspection. I cleared out the pantry and rearranged it (which makes it work better). I pulled everything out of the laundry room, reorganized it, and built shelves out of crates, so it’s usable space and we can get at everything. I rearranged my room quite a bit. There’s more to do to make it the sanctuary I want, but at least it’s neat. Reorganized a bunch of things in the office and the sewing room and the living room. We hung up some more pictures and other art things. I cleaned off/out the rolltop desk (which lives in the sewing room in this place), and now it’s usable workspace again. I want to paint the filing cabinets teal and do the handles in a really pretty silver, but that couldn’t happen this weekend.
I also sewed the new curtain panel from The Kitchen Island Cart from Hell, a nice, bright sunflower fabric. All handstitched, because setting up the sewing machine seemed like too much work. It only took a couple of hours by hand, and the natural light was excellent this weekend. I sewed the back panel (coral and fishes) and velcro’d it on, so I can take it off and wash it as needed (I mean, kitchen. Things spill). Someone wondered why I hadn’t just stapled it on, and, frankly, it never occurred to me.
I read the book for review. I was assigned a novel to read for analysis as a something for potential adaptation, which I did. It was by an author whose work I know well, and for a company who has a script in production that I read a few months ago (and really liked).
I got out a couple of LOIs, including one to teach for a writers’ organization.
And, around all the organizing and unpacking boxes and getting rid of stuff that we don’t need, there was also lots of vacuuming and scrubbing floors and cleaning mirrors, and all the rest.
In other words, a good portion of our fall cleaning is done early. Which is great. On September 1, I’ll swap out the fabrics on the tables, etc. Oct. 1 is when the spiderweb curtains go up, and we put up the Samhain decorations.
But I’m tired and achy from moving stuff around and climbing up on stepstools and all the rest. And I’m worried, because I didn’t get in as much script coverage as I hoped these last two weeks – a combination of burnout, and that there just wasn’t all that much out there, and much of what was paid way too little.
That Virgo new moon is a hard taskmaster! But I went very Virgo-y, with all the organization, and things do look good. I even put the handmade double wedding ring quilt on my bed, which I bought in Plymouth a couple of years before we even moved to the Cape, and I’ve never used. It’s a gorgeous piece of usable art. Charlotte adores it. She better not puke on it.
But all of that physical work also gave me time to think. I am happiest when I focus on the work. I get grumpy and frustrated when people try to pull me off my work to serve their agendas (especially when they try to get me to work for free).
Why have I been able to make a living in the arts since I was 18? Because I didn’t let other people derail the work. Because I didn’t let them force their agenda into my priorities and syphon off my energy and creativity to serve them. I allowed it far too often on the Cape, because I was trying to figure out how to navigate civilian life, and let people take advantage. And it was always to my detriment.
My joy is in the work. I am a writer who loves the actual writing. So I need to get back to the work and focus on the work, and let the rest fall away. That way, I’m doing the work that keeps a roof over our heads AND doing the work I love to do.
Boundaries. Boundaries. Boundaries.
Which fits in well with this new moon Virgo energy.
Of course, now we’ve moved into Libra, and we have a fuckton of retrogrades, with the Mercury Retrograde looming over us, but focusing on the work is the key.
And there’s still a pandemic going on, so it’s not like it even makes sense for a sane person to get on a plane, be It for a vacation or a conference) and go dancing around unmasked. I got five emails over the weekend canceling events due to “unexpected circumstances.” When I asked what those were, they were all COVID. Stop fucking gaslighting. COVID is not an “unexpected circumstance” when you haven’t followed protocols. It’s a given. Stop lying. I mean, I wasn’t planning on attending any of those events anyway, due to lack of safety protocols. But the lying really bothers me.
Anyway, I have to finish my analysis for the book’s potential for adaptation. I’m waiting for the inspector. I have to take my mom to the doctor. I have another script to turn around this afternoon. And it’s hot and humid, still.
But tomorrow, I can go back to the work.
Peace, friends.