In the eastern sky right now, at 5:30 or so in the morning eastern time, the waning moon hangs like a ship, crescent turned down to the horizon. Below it is Venus, a bright signal. Below that is either Jupiter (I think it’s Jupiter, because I think Saturn is in the evening sky these days), enormously bright and amazing.
I am not a believer in astrology by any means, but I do look at it and wonder. Venus is the planet representing passion. The moon in its waning represents gathering darkness. Jupiter represents law and authority. So Passion is rising out of the grasp of law and authority into gathering darkness.
Or is it that gathering darkness and dangerous passion will soon be subjects again of law and authority?
As always, the devil is in the details. In any case, it’s amazingly beautiful, and strangely profound.
In other news, the ongoing operations in Fallujah, Iraq, are really hard to grasp. The city normally has a population of about 250,000 people, I guess, but the news reports are saying that only 60,000 to 70,000 people are still inside the city. I wanted to get a sense of what kind of house-to-house operations we’re talking about for a city of that size. So, I did a little US Census cruising to see what’s around 250,000 people that I know.
The short answer is that Fallujah is about the size of Portland, ME, and some of the surrounding towns, normally. And currently, the population of Fallujah has dropped to about that of my hometown…. not where I currently live, but where I lived when I was growing up. Thinking in these terms kinda puts the whole attack in perspective. Hmmm.