Mercury stations direct Wednesday night in Cancer at 11:58 pm EDT (3:57:41 UTC Thursday). This happens just 46 minutes after the Leo New Moon is exact. ‘Hump day’ may feel more like ‘bump day’ with some unexpected moments, and it looks like they’ll arrive with an important question: Are you willing to see through the bullshit (including your own) — and can you have a sense of humor about it?

Found object display from Bare Portland’s “unboxing party,” in which the contents of an auctioned storage pod have become the basis for a multi-stage, participatory theater piece. Photo by Amanda Painter.

Here’s what’s up astrologically: Mercury is stationing conjunct the degree where the Sun was for the July 16 eclipse — which is square Eris in Aries.

Mercury may be the planet of the mind and communication, but in myth he was also the Trickster — in kind of a little kid way. Eris also has an element of that, though seemingly less playfully in her myths. Hence the idea that a sense of humor could be useful this week, particularly as we get to Wednesday and Thursday; Mercury stationing direct can be marked by a revelation of truth or previously missing information.

Given that the Mercury-Eris aspect is a square (rather than, say, an opposition), this may describe you revealing the truth to yourself as much as speaking it to someone else, or having someone speak it to you.

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This morning (Sunday), retrograde Mercury and the Sun aligned in a conjunction, marking the midpoint of Mercury retrograde. That retrograde ends on July 31, with Mercury in a square to Eris (and conjunct the recent eclipse degree). This suggests that we’re heading toward some unexpected development that has the power to shake things up, though in subtle ways.

Seed head of a Tragopogon or Goat’s Beard; photo by Amanda Painter.

You will definitely want to keep your sense of humor through this phase, and treat lightly any gaffes, mishaps or lapses of reason that infiltrate your reality.

Mercury is considered the trickster, though in truth, Eris is the very master of the game, and the two will be provoking one another. Eris, particularly in Aries, would appear to signify a more aggressive form of game playing; Mercury’s tricks in myth generally were of a lighter tone, though anything in Cancer can veer into hypersensitivity.

This could be especially true if you’ve been re-living or trying to disengage from old scripts or triggers from the past. What tricks can you employ to avoid getting re-snared — in other words, what have you learned in recent weeks?

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This Tuesday, July 16, is the Capricorn Full Moon and partial lunar eclipse. It’s essentially direct-dialing into the Saturn-Pluto conjunction of January 2020 — no operator to transfer the call, no Skype interface, no going straight to voicemail. Whatever comes up for you this week with this eclipse is most likely to be what the Saturn-Pluto conjunction is about for you in January.

Image by Lisa Ann Yount.

Is your reflexive response to reading that one of fear, or a desire to avoid it all? Are you at all curious? What are you feeling, and do you have any strategies to address it?

As was noted in the Thursday edition, all the biggest issues right now are Capricorn related: things like family, work responsibility, accountability in many other forms, and corporate and government power. Related to its Saturn rulership, sometimes events or natal chart placements in Capricorn can feel heavy or depressive. Capricorn issues tend to feel very ‘real’ — as in: tangible, concrete, inescapable. Unlike, say, Pisces with its dreamy, ephemeral flow; or Sagittarius with its philosophical abstractions.

So not only does a Full Moon inherently imply a confrontation, but there’s something about that idea carried by the sign Capricorn itself. There are times when we can think of confrontation as being like a dance: two partners facing each other, moving in synchrony with give and take, or with a clear lead and a responsive follow. It can be a negotiation process. Sometimes confrontation is more like mirroring: being met externally by something or someone that offers a view of our inner selves that would otherwise be hard to see and understand.

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Mercury is stationary and just switched to apparent retrograde motion at 7:14 pm EDT (23:14:20 UTC) tonight. It will station direct on July 31 (or Aug. 1 for some time zones). You can read a little more about tonight’s chart here. Of course, no planets actually physically change direction; it’s just a trick of perception due to our perspective here on Earth.

Macro shot of an exotic peony; photo by Amanda Painter.

Even so, Mercury retrogrades do seem to offer unique opportunities for review and introspection — and sometimes maddening glitches. A couple of aspects this week suggest some extra weight and energy to this process, along with the current eclipses.

You likely know by now that Mercury retrogrades tend to be easier to handle the more willing one is to slow down — whether that means being more deliberate in thought, pausing before sending a text or email, delaying major purchases or negotiations, or checking event details before rushing out the door (not to mention staying focused while driving). Yet that’s often easier said than done, particularly in our increasingly fast-paced and digitally based world.

If there are patterns you’d like to shift regarding the ways you handle communication — such as reacting while defensive, over-identifying with your ideas and statements on social media, or more general habits — this particular retrograde may offer a boost with that, since it’s beginning between two eclipses. (We had a total solar eclipse in Cancer on July 2, and the corresponding lunar eclipse is July 16-17, with the Capricorn Full Moon.)

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