The great hero Perseus wore the helmet of Pluto and carried the Harpe sword of Saturn, items loaned to him by his father Jupiter, to kill Medusa (who gained her famous snake hair when Athena punished her for Neptune’s seduction/rape in her temple). Perseus then saved Andromeda by killing the great sea monster Cetus. Pisces, the last sign of the zodiac and the great sea, brings forward the essence of the system that made it. Perseus heroically kills (Aries) the sea monsters of the last system and starts the new system. Aries is the first sign of the zodiac. When Perseus appears you will see his glyph (♇♄) in the horoscope.
On January 12, 2020, Perseus appeared once again in Capricorn. The conjunction of Saturn and Pluto occurred at 11:57 am over Washington, DC. This new system will be built in the 2nd house (Taurus, Ceres*, food, values, skills, assets) of the USA Sibly chart.
The Meaning of the 1982 Perseus Return
The last time Perseus appeared was early November 1982 in Libra. Libra rules money, seeking balance, trade, the lower courts, justice, fairness, diplomacy, marriage, partnership, open enemies and indecision. Libra is connected with women with its association with its ruling planet Venus. The USA Sibly chart had this 1982 transit in the 10th house. In the USA, that new system happened in the public square, and in corporations. This was the most public system; marriage equality, political debate and new rights and protections, and court imposed child custody arrangements have changed and now revolve around balanced time with each parent for better or worse. All of this was easily observable. Changes came and women had careers, new positions of power economically, and gained new employment rights. Although, the system was not solely about women’s rights, take a look about general surveys on who does household chores in 1980 versus 2020. This Libra system didn’t happen at home, this was all top down.
Giant progress was made but there has also been sea monsters swimming in this ocean, massive diplomatic treaties to regulate world affairs that are at best window dressing and at worse legal instruments memorializing unbalanced deals that are parasitic and destructive to certain nations, complex monetary arrangements such as toxic credit derivatives that spread risk everywhere, financial crises and bank failures, trade deficits, and, more individually painful, marriage rates started declining and out of wedlock births to single working mothers massively increased. Those children are more likely to live in poverty. Poverty itself lost its traditional meaning of lack of things and became about lack of money.
“Marriage rates increased beginning in 1963, reaching a relative peak of 10.9 in 1972. The rate then fell to 9.9 during 1976 and 1977 before increasing to 10.6 in 1980–1982. From 1982 to 2009, marriage rates almost steadily declined, before stabilizing from 2009 to 2017 at a range between 6.8 and 7.0. From 2017 to 2018, the rate dropped 6%, from to 6.9 per 1,000 population to 6.5, the lowest of the 1900–2018 period.” -Marriage Rates in the United States, 1900–2018, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Libra systems are almost always unbalanced or in some precarious state of balance. Picture the scales perfectly balanced and everyone holding their breath. That 37 year system is now astrological history. No need for concern though, the USA always has Libra in the 10th house, we just aren’t going to focus on it intensely for the next 33 years. Perseus arrived on January 12, 2020 and the Libra sea monsters are falling dead at an astounding rate.
Slaying of the Libran Sea Monsters
“What sea monsters?”, you ask. This happened in private. The 2nd house is below the horizon, hidden from public view. The coronavirus paralyzed the system, much like Medusa’s stone gaze. Social distancing is in. Air (Libra) is definitely out of fashion. Immediately, almost everyone was sent home. Some types of businesses could keep their employees working at home. Producers of essential supplies and food had to keep working. Executive Orders (Capricorn) from the President and Governors exempted essential businesses (2nd house) or required those businesses to continue operations. They may have slowed down but they weren’t turned to stone. During the event, supplies and food disappeared or was scarce for months. Money (Libra) didn’t matter, what your community actually produced (Taurus) mattered. In my community, many families still have their parents and grandparents Great Depression ration coupon books but all the fuel coupons are gone but there are plenty of unused food coupons. They didn’t need food because they were self-sufficient producers and savers of food. Ninety years later, we couldn’t get paper products here but the food plants donated cases of food to essential workers and later they donated to the fire companies who sold it inexpensively to the community. Those food items never disappeared from our store shelves.
Americans started quietly changing their behavior. What have Americans been doing quietly behind their front doors? Skill building hobbies, stockpiling goods, improvement projects, re-learning subjects to teach your kids? Taurus all except that last bit about school kids, that’s all Gemini.
“Americans began 2020 owing more than $1 trillion in credit card debt after a $76.7 billion net increase during 2019. Consumers quickly changed course, however, posting the biggest first-quarter credit card debt paydown ever, at $60 billion. This was followed by another record in Q2, when consumers payed down $58 billion more in credit card debt. Although first quarter paydowns are normal, Q2 2020 marks the first time in more than 30 years that credit card debt has dropped from April through June.” – 2020 Credit Card Debt Study, Wallethub, Italics Added
The 2nd house is a fixed earth house and is the storehouse and the tool shed. This is not about money this is about survival and comfort while surviving. This translates to material things, food, skills, and all values and valuables.
Fathers and the patriarchy are also back. Capricorn is the father, the archetype of the authoritarian parent, (in my case, this was my mother since I mostly grew up during the Libra Perseus period) that rips the blanket off you at 5 am so he can go to work and you can go to school. He loves you enough to turn you into a person he respects. This means he will put you in situations where you will be miserable so you have enough discipline and drive to be the top executive of your successful business at a young age like 31. America’s Capricorn in 2nd house is discipline and hard work. This is why America is wealthy but, after focusing on this for the next three decades, she is about to be a lot wealthier. There is also a trine between Capricorn Perseus and America’s Virgo Neptune. Perseus is easily and directly linked into the ideal of the American dream that immigrants have of our country. The next Perseus return, a collection of three exact conjunctions, starts in June 2053 with the last being February 2054.
Perseus’ 2020 Entourage
This Capricorn Perseus Return has greater weight than usual. A lot of additional weight, a stellium of planets arrived. Perseus had a lot of help from the gods on his quest. Ceres, Mercury and the Sun all attended in 2020. First and foremost, the produce will go into American storehouses (2nd house). Then secondarily the produce of this stellium will also be directed toward parts of America’s 5th house (playgrounds of all types such as theaters), all of the 6th house (work sites, industrial sites, health care sites, labor union halls of all types), part of the 7th house (small courthouses, trade areas of all types, embassies and diplomatic posts in the USA) part of the 8th (places of power, mines, forges, foundries, smelters, power plants) and part of the 9th (international American locations, higher education campuses, higher courthouses).
It’s Not Pluto
Perseus wields the Harpe sword of Saturn. This sword castrated Uranus (progress for progress sake) that let Saturn usher in a Golden Age. The Pluto helmet of invisibility lets Perseus sneak up on whichever sea monster he intends to slay. This is not your average Saturn Return or Pluto chart aspect. Maybe you have been comfortable and feeling secure that the world agrees with you or you understand how the world works, just go ahead and let that go. No one who was not born in the past year or two gets to feel that way now.
If you are younger than the age of 39 (born in 1981 until 2018), that rushing forward motion you were accustomed to your entire life has shifted. You have or will very soon mature (Saturn) and realize it takes effort to carry those past ideas (air, Libra Perseus) forward without the sea current doing a lot of the work for you. Sometimes you may need to swim against the current and that will build powerful muscles. Embrace maturity (Saturn) and power (Pluto). You are as much a part of that shifting current as anyone else. The sabian symbol for 22° Capricorn is “by accepting defeat gracefully, a general reveals nobility of character”. It is through losing that you show your inner value. Unlike Libra who likes to partner up and help, Capricorn is about earning respect. For America, this is going to be a tough 33 years but by the time we have climbed this mountain we will all know our real measure.