Today is the one month anniversary of Colin’s Catastrophe. Just as his sudden jolt out of the blue began with a New Moon in Leo (exactly square his Neptune in Scorpio, thus plummeting him to the mysterious depths) so does this one month anniversary coincide with today’s New Moon in Virgo, exactly square his intensely mentally curious Jupiter in Gemini and just past exact conjunction with his generational (and in his case, highly inventive) Uranus/Pluto conjunction in analytic Virgo. Lots of mental activity promised this month, figuring things out!

And, I’d say, especially since on this very day, Mercury, which governs Virgo, turns to go direct after three weeks retrograde, backing up over old ground. In other words, we can expect more forward motion from today on, at least in immediate decisions, etc. On the other hand, the longer cycled planets are all retrograde, so much churning, reliving, working through difficulties, until the end of January, when they will have all turned, one by one a month, to go direct.

I wonder if that will be when he is released to come home from the coming “urgent care” facility near here, where he will learn to both control his bowels and get strong enough to lift himself into and out from wheelchair to bed.

I ran into a naturopath who used to live in our neighborhood in our Bloomington Co-op yesterday. I had been thinking that, when Colin gets well enough, I might make an appointment for him at his Center. After I told him what had happened, he responded, shuddering, “Oh yes, I know what that is; and I’m very familiar with heart-related miracles — but for strokes.” Like everyone, he was utterly astonished that Colin had survived not only the two surgeries themselves, to “fix” drastic dissections of ascending and descending branches of the aorta, but the more than four hours prior to surgery. Called what happened “catastrophic,” the same word I use.

Told him about Colin feeling his life force begin to surge back about two weeks into his journey, at which point he felt he would live, was indeed determined to live.

The naturopath said that it sounds like with his life force moving, and, given all I’ve said, the direction is up, then no need to see him. “Just continue with what you are doing.” He repeated that, several times.

Okay! Meanwhile, Colin tells me tales of patients on his heart care floor (none of whom, unlike him, are paralyzed) who are not just mean to the nurses, but some actually throw things at the nurses! (Sounds like their heart attacks did NOT result in heart openings . . .). The nurses continually tell him that he is their most cheerful patient.

And yet, this morning, when one of the nurses came to give him his scheduled injections into the belly (he’s had 160 injections into that area so far . . .), she only gave one injection instead of the usual two. How about the other one, he asked her. She said she had used a special device to inject him (can’t remember the name), so that he only needed one. He asked why didn’t the other nurses use that device? “Probably lazy,” she answered.

“So,” he exclaims over the phone on our early morning call, “I could have had 80 injections, instead of 160!”

More and more, his hospital experience reminds me of life elsewhere: kind and unkind, good and bad, conscious and unconscious, organized and messed up . . . on and on. LIFE, ON EARTH!

His best friend Josh visited yesterday afternoon, just before Sean arrived, and told him of a wheelchair with all the bells and whistles for sale on facebook marketplace. Only $500. “Should I get it?” YES!

Colin wants to power his own wheelchair eventually, but meanwhile this is would be great and used as a backup later. Besides, as Josh pointed out, “maybe we can both take beers, with you in your wheelchair and me in the spare, and zip around the neighborhood!”

Hard not to laugh at that image.

Colin was out in the sun for ten minutes in a wheelchair yesterday. Hopes for longer today; in fact has now agreed to be part of an experiment where he would be out there for 30 minutes, and they would even have him smell the flowers and take his shoes off, have his feet touch the ground.

YES!