A correspondence interrupted // Mercury Rx in Libra Day 01

My first (& favourite) research methods professor died the morning of Day 1 of Mercury Rx in Libra. Many of that generation’s professors passed these past weeks. The only death that broke me into sobs was his.

We’d corresponded privately long after the semester was over. He was a cosmopolitan Marxian economist, a formidable quant jock and former department chair who had consulted for big development institutions. I was a lefty military kid with a taste for unstructured qualitative research and theory. Somehow we got on.

Our conversations were never about the technical act of doing research. We spoke at length about the social experience of ‘being international’ – something impossible to understand unless you’re a PhD scholar from a minority country, studying in a wealthy Western democracy, with their money and on their terms. It’s a category of being most people think does not or should not exist.

Our first online conversation on Facebook Messenger was about sexuality. My ‘becoming international’ coincided with my coming of age. Suddenly I was around all these guys giving me messages I never had to decode before. I felt awkward asking him for advice, knowing he was so busy. I didn’t have non-male friends I felt safe with. He responded with grace, lengthy detail and the non-racist, non-sexist extreme political incorrectness you need when you’re young, alone in a new country, surrounded by people who’ve had way more sex than you.

I’m not sure what he got from our chats. Maybe when you’re older, you get nostalgic for what it was like being a young researcher learning about stuff at the same time you’re learning about the world and your place in it. Everything’s new. Things are scary but you’re innocent. (At least you think you are). You’re about to get all your first times, not knowing they’re all last times too.

The last conversation we had was about someone who had been Thalía’s interpreter during her trip to the Philippines. He was less available then. Maybe he was busier. Maybe my questions were less interesting. I was ashamed about dropping out of my PhD after four years. I wanted him to be proud of me. I felt like I’d failed him and everyone who had ever taught me.

I wish I’d pushed past the shame. Reached out more.

From earth, retrograding planets appear to move backward. They re-tread degrees of arc they’ve already crossed. They call us to review, reflect. Mercury is about consciousness. Mercury Rx challenges us to rethink what we think we know, to be wary of surface ‘truths.’ In an Air Sign like Libra, it’s a good time to check if the invisible beliefs that underlie our behaviour still suit our circumstances. What does fairness look and feel like? Who gets to decide what justice means? Can connection exist without acknowledging what hurts?

I wish I had questioned and fought back my shame. I wish I hadn’t let my shame stop me from staying connected.

What are you fighting this Mercury Rx?

What are you fighting for?