Reading the Signs

I am a Taurus. Well, that’s my sun sign. And I am addicted to astrology.

I realized this yesterday, when I had a panic attack. Twice, on my way to the Quad, I swiveled around on Garden Street, certain someone was calling my name. “Hey Asli,” I heard. It was a woman. Maybe she was calling, “Hey, ask me!” or “Hey, Ashley,” I thought. There aren’t many Aslis wandering around New England, after all. But no one was there.

At that moment, my horoscope for the week flashed across my mind: “Don’t be too alarmed if you start to see or hear things that aren’t there—it’s just your subconscious trying to spice things up a little! Go with the flow and things should settle down soon.” Comforting words, perhaps, but a shiver still crawled up my spine.

This was more than just a coincidence. Three days earlier, I was meant to navigate a trying ordeal because the planets were misaligned—and I couldn’t use credit at Boston Tea Stop. A week earlier, I was supposed to undergo a difficult negotiation, and I had a face-off on that narrow little sidewalk down Plympton when some frail little freshman was skittering in the other direction. There was only room for one of us.

Normally, I would use my massive size and sheer physical force to barrel by her. But this time, I hesitated, then stepped into the street.

“Be the bigger person,” my horoscope had advised me. But instead, I felt small.

As I write, Venus is entering the seventh house, and things are supposed to get better. Still, I am dreading this month. November is rough for those of us born in May, even worse when your moon sign is Gemini.

More importantly, every action suddenly has some ulterior cosmic meaning. These predictions are starting to whittle away at my sense of autonomy.

I wasn’t always blinded by the stars. In fact, most things I love in life began as jokes. But then, slowly, somewhere between puberty and freshman year, they turned serious. Dead serious. Take, for instance, the Xanga page I curated until well after I was legally an adult. Then, there’s the first six seasons of “Degrassi: The Next Generation.” Also my wardrobe, generally. And learning, and then regularly using, the NATO phonetic alphabet. Even my firm belief that, even though I didn’t live in a glamorous alternate universe or have creepily perfect teeth like Kristen Bell, I am, in fact, just like Veronica Mars.

I remember being cynical even as a young child. I never liked horses or movies with dogs as the protagonists. Whenever I played Barbie with friends I would rename the doll “Vivian” and weave tragic yarns in which she wound up destitute and hopeless, forced to sell her dream house to Keisha and curse philandering Ken. (My elder sister watched The Lifetime Network. A lot.)

I recall these things because, in some ways, I am still like that. I’m not the kind of person who goes for palm readings or deciphers tarot cards, and I never thought Ms. Cleo was any more clairvoyant than a fortune on a popsicle stick. But as suspicious and dry as I may be, I like to think that there is some sort of order to things. It may as well be a cosmic one.

And perhaps astrology has its own peculiar appeal. Maybe it’s because I’m on the cusp of adulthood. I turned 21 and a half this past Monday, and all of a sudden I realized that pop stars are all younger than me and the average Real World contestant is my age. Some of the girls I once played Barbie with are now married, or worse, have their own little babies who have their own little sun signs. I, on the other hand, am still counting half birthdays as legitimate events.

I’m young, but I’m too old to be cynical about everything. Things are beginning to matter.

And there is some comfort in knowing that there is a set of ancient, celestial guiding principles, a galactically correct course of action. If anything, horoscopes make me think about the big picture in a way I haven’t before, especially at Harvard. It’s easy to go through the motions, to think of the little things, to feel independent, responsible, and alone.

And though this month looks like it’s going to be rough in the little ways, it has so far been oddly comforting. There is something about knowing that competitors and allies are governed by the same stars and houses, that somewhere, deep in the recesses of outer space, Jupiter is slowly nudging me along regardless of how much I screw up. If only my e-recruiting Taurus friends knew that Neptune was ruling their professional tenth house sector, and things were looking up, I think they all would be a bit sunnier. Or if my best friend knew she was feeling low because—obviously—Mercury is in retrograde.

But that’s the thing about horoscopes. You have to embrace them. You can’t choose to ignore the bad ones and listen to the good ones. And they are nuanced: the bad omens are not so bad, and the good signs are something else altogether. The stars are populated with possibilities and courses of action rather than good and evil or right and wrong.

And, ultimately, the whole point of horoscopes is that you don’t really know what will happen, it’s the process of unwrapping the mystery that is exciting. I know next year is supposed to be strong for Tauri. Maybe that means I’ll actually finish my thesis. Or, hell, even graduate! If it’s not guaranteed, at least it might be written in the stars.

—Asli A. Bashir '10 is a History and Literature concentrator in Currier House. She dedicates this endpaper to Emily C. Graff '10, perennial astrology expert and occasional life coach.