An hour before arriving, he calls me, excited, to let me know that he’s running late. He explains that he got caught up in the calculations for my natal chart. Out of the hundreds of readings he’s done, both personally and professionally, he hasn’t seen a chart like mine. It’s described as a bundle, where all ten planets are contained within 1/3 of the 360° chart. This means that my energy is concentrated, focused, self-driven.
The reading takes four hours of calculations and preparation, with an hour-and-a-half session of thorough explanation. After helping him with his new computer last month, a trivial favour for me but a big one to him and his family, he offered a reading in return. I happily accepted, never being one to dismiss such a unique offer. He swore me to secrecy because he’s retired, and will only do this service as a special favour.
Before he begins explaining though, he tells me that I can take the information he gives me for what it’s worth. He doesn’t tell fortunes, he simply sees patterns in the numbers. It’s up to us, our personality, our decisions, to determine our fate. “Character is destiny”, he says.
I cannot describe this man.
There’s too much to him. Too many facets, too deep a personality. He’s a book unto himself. I could explain as much as I could about him, and one would still have no idea what to expect when meeting him. Even today, he surprises me every time I see him. I tell people that he’s a stay-at-home dad, an athlete, a writer, an astrologist, but I haven’t really described him at all.
The chart offers a subtle glimpse. The stokes are wide, large, and deep with conviction. It’s a mix of cursive and printing, a general insighting into his flexibility. His notes are messy, corrected. He prides himself on being accurate, not vague like the farcical daily horoscopes, and it’s for this reason that I start to believe him. There are things that he describes to me — my penchent for revenge, my philosophical pursuits, my affinity for certain sports — that slowly bring my ever-present, skeptical guard down. He says that I have a natural creativity, that I’m visually artistic, that I see colours differently from other people. Because of this, he encourages me to start making money off my art within the next 15 years, or I’ll have missed a good opportunity. Sometimes it goes over my head; the positions of my planets, my houses, my sagittarius ascendant. He goes into so much detail about my career, romance, sports, travel, and friends that I can’t begin to list it all.
Although there are a few points of inaccuracy, I have trust in what he tells me. Ceasar said “men willingly believe what they wish”, and perhaps I’m simply one of these men. So will this change me? Will I act on these new insights and become a self-fulfilling prophecy? Will I discard them, and end up with the same fate? Maybe it’s wrong altogether, some soothing snake-oil, although I don’t think this is true for reasons I can’t explain. It’s too soon for me to tell just yet.
All I know is that I’d like to be like this man. I’d like to be as complex, as indescribable as he is.
Maybe one day, if destiny is character.