Zodiac Maniacs

Sometimes I read my horoscope and wonder if my fellow Geminis in the Sunni Triangle are “dressing for success today” and “playing it coy around that special Scorpio.” When you think about it, dressing for success might just as well mean body armor as a pair of Lucky jeans. And “coy” could be a euphemism for “remain indoors after curfew.”

Once, back in Hazel Park Junior High, my study buddy Judy, who was convinced that our fates would be forever intertwined, passed me her dog-eared copy of Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs under the desk in science class. It was a paperback as thick as a three-egg omelette, with the binding broken in the “Libra/Capricorn” chapter. That chapter foretold the marvelous life Judy could expect to start living once she began going out with the most popular boy in school. To be fair, the binding of this well-thumbed tome was also creased at the “Gemini/Aquarius” chapter, which highlighted what I could expect when I began going out with the friend of the most popular boy in school. Judy would also pass me long, speculative, dreamy notes. What the four of us would wear to prom, to our double wedding ceremony, and how we would live in houses next door to one another. BFFs forever. Yes, Sun Signs had it all worked out.

Judy and I were roly-poly girls. We wore thick eyeglasses with plastic frames and ill-fitting clothes a season or two this side of stylish. Judy wrote out all of her class papers in dense, tiny, box-like characters that made every assignment she handed in look eerie and disturbed, like a furious ransom note. I was the type of girl who told disgusting jokes about bodily functions and laughed like a horse. I won’t try to kid you, I haven’t changed all that much. I didn’t need Ms. Linda Goodman to tell me our romantic futures. At slumber party séances, when I asked the Ouija board if I would get a date for the Snow Daze Dance, the plastic cursor would glide smoothly to no. Coincidence, or a warning from Captain Howdy?

But even then, I understood the appeal of a horoscope. My tightly wound pal just wanted something, somewhere in the world, to make sense. Horoscopes offered a strange sort of hope. Because if every single personality trait, kink, and circumstance is written in the stars, then the notion of chance is snuffed out. If all people boil down to the sum of a mathematical equation, it erases the fear that humankind is just a random cell circus, tossed about in the big ol’ bingo hopper of life. Despite Ms. Goodman’s astonishing powers of prediction, I lost track of Judy once she made the college prep courses in ninth grade. Different crowds. (Have you ever gone to a Chess Club kegger?) Now I only check the horoscope once in a while, when I wonder what Judy’s up to.

These days, a Sagittarian friend reads me her horoscope when many changes in her life are afoot. This woman always reads her newspaper fortunes to me with a quiet tone of finality, as if the die is cast and certain things can’t be helped. Because hey, if Mars moves into Capricorn and it stirs up the eighth house of transformation on casual Fridays, what exactly is there to be done about it? This same friend sleeps with her head at the foot of her bed whenever there is a full moon. I forget what mystical, Stevie Nicksian purpose this ritual serves, but I know she feels compelled to do it. Also, when she wants to sever contact with an annoying acquaintance, she writes the name down on a slip of paper and throws it into her crackling fireplace. Works every time. Well, it probably helps that she also stops returning their phone calls. This friend also lives in a South Minneapolis Tudor cottage constructed entirely of peppermint candy and sleeps with five cats. Just kidding. Except about the cats.

I don’t mean to be a doubting Thomasina, but if the world’s events could really be charted and manipulated simply by being aware of one’s birth order and the lunar calendar, then I’m pretty sure the Renaissance Festival would operate year round, if you get my drift.

The astrological wheel is confusing enough without bringing Chinese restaurant placemat soul animals into the mix. What am I, again? A monkey or twins? Twin monkeys? Well, that explains everything. Now give us a banana before we smear feces all over our cage and call you dirty names in sign language.

As a longtime student of human behaviors (i.e. waitress), I’ve got to tell you, I’m more inclined these days to believe in a simple triumvirate to assign personality roles. I think people basically come in three types. Rock, paper, or scissors. Which are you?