The Sun enters the fixed sign Scorpio at 1:19:41 pm EDT on Wednesday, Oct. 23. If you’re into the dark and alluring aspects of life, Scorpio time can stir up deep feelings. Earlier nightfall, Halloween, Days of the Dead, the season of the final harvest all evoke a sense of transition and the passage of time made palpable.

‘The Lost Sea‘, the largest underground lake in the U.S. Originally discovered by a 13-year-old boy, it’s in Sweetwater, TN.

As for its astrological properties: what is a fixed water sign? Water flows; it takes the shape of its container. It can soak through anything. There’s no such thing as “waterproof.”

How can it be a fixed factor? For examples of fixed water, ice comes to mind; so too does fossilized seawater, such as exists in great amounts beneath Michigan. Then there are the Rift Lakes in Africa, which are contained, inland lakes with the pH of seawater. Can you think of any other examples?

One property of our time is that much of the water we count on to be fixed, in Antarctica and around the North Pole, is melting. As it does so, it releases to the atmosphere millions of tons of methane, and floods the oceans with fresh water, with many different effects on climate.

Regarding its spiritual properties, we look to Scorpio for passion, pathos, sexual feelings; ideas of death and transformation and jealousy come to mind. Scorpios tend to be perceived as a little edgy, for their ability to go where most people will not. Are Scorpios more sexual than other signs? It’s possible, though there is something distinctive in the mix of physical sexuality, emotional eroticism, and the death-surrender-transformation nexus associated with this sign.

The Sun Joins Other Planets

The inner planets Mercury and Venus stay close to the Sun. Mercury is always within 28 degrees of the Sun; Venus is always within 45 degrees from the Sun.

Reed Flute’s motionless lake in Guilin, Guangxi, China, is lit up by the colourful limestone cave. Photo by Dennis Jarvis.

When the Sun enters Scorpio on Wednesday, it will join both Venus and Mercury, as well as one of the original four asteroids, (2) Pallas, discovered in 1802.

She is a big one, taking up 7% of the total mass of the inner asteroid belt (Ceres accounts for about a third of the total mass). Pallas is associated with rationality, reason, law and politics. It grants emotional detachment and has a distinctly nonsexual feeling. (Athena, associated with this point, was born from her father’s head, in full armor. It was a sexless conception and birth, and this goddess manifestation was ready for action.)

The Mercury-Pallas conjunction illustrates the potential to speak about deep subject matter in an objective way. The topics that Scorpio represents generally spook humans so fast, the conversation usually lasts three minutes, maximum. This is a time to share personal secrets: anything that you’ve been wanting to get out but could not, for whatever reason.

However, Pallas advises that you not weaponize your personal truth. This would be easy; for example, to play the game “Now I’ve Got You, You Son of a Bitch” (of Games People Play fame). Skip that part and let the basic truth of your reality have the power that it has. You don’t need to push the truth; let it speak gently, for itself.

Mercury Retrograde and Conjunctions to Pallas

Mercury is about to be retrograde (Oct. 31 through Nov. 20). During the retrograde and the preseason (which we’re currently in), Mercury will make three conjunctions to Pallas: Oct. 21 (in Scorpio), Nov. 2 (in Scorpio) and Dec. 21 (in Sagittarius).

In the public realm, this is about political revelations — and it’s interesting that this whole process will take place during the first presidential impeachment of the century, and the second ever in modern American history (Nixon does not count; he was never actually put on trial, though we learned a lot).

Endless Caverns, near New Market, Virginia; photo by Susana Raab.

The stations of Mercury, on their own, have a way of flushing out the truth.

I’ve noticed that this happens around the time of the stations, whether retrograde or direct; and during the interior conjunction of the Mercury and the Sun, which takes place on Nov. 11. As we are seeing (which I suggested recently), once this gets moving, more and more information is going to pour out of the process.

This may reach a point of comical absurdity, with Mercury dancing around Pallas, in Scorpio of all places, for much of the proceedings.

The retrograde is likely to disrupt or complicate plans to have the Articles of Impeachment ready by Thanksgiving Day (Nov. 28) but it is possible, and thankfully, they will be submitted after the retrograde ends.