today dawned sharp and clear, beautiful, spring is raging here in southern illinois, and that means everyone's allergies are acting up and the grass is growing so fast you have to start back at the beginning when you finish, and just keep mowing. but since it's my birthday, april 21st, i thought i'd give you a composite summary of everything i know about this day just so you have some background into what it's like to have a birthday on the cusp of aries and taurus, in the heart of april rocks birthday season. the queen of england abandoned the birthday, and holds her celebration in june, but that's partly because a lot more people are involved, and getting them all out to wherever she celebrates is a wet & mucky mess, maybe, at this time of year. for me, and john muir, and that guy i met picking blueberries in alaska one day, that was never such an issue. we americans just tend to take that day, and expect everyone to provide us with cake, and a night out, or whatever.

so it happened that one year in the 70's they celebrated earth day on this day, and it was a fairly big hit, so much so that they decided to do it again the following year. they had originally picked muir's birthday because they figured, you might as well, it's as good as any. but the following year it had moved from saturday to friday, so they decided, on the next year, to make it the 22nd, and that was the year it really made it big, it was huge, thousands of people came out, so it's been the 22nd ever since. now that's my memory, best i can remember, but it shows how the history of earth day/birth day are kind of intertwined.

having a birthday at this time of year allows you to catalogue exactly what kind of weather one can expect in mid-late april every year, but i can tell you that that was more interesting in iowa, when you could occasionally get bleak blustery winterish stuff even in late april, and the state's worst blizzard ever was recorded april 9th or some such day. here, it's almost always spring; it's almost always ok to plant stuff; only some years, we're lucky like now and it's not steamy and hot and fixin' to stay that way for another nine months.

so what is it like to be on the cusp of aries and taurus? maybe it works on one's mind, more than it truly makes any difference. after all, i live in this world, and am far more a product of how i was brought up, where i was, what i did, where i went to school, etc. than i could possibly be, a product of where the stars were placed on that moment of my birth, in euclid ohio in 1954. but i can tell you this. taurus is the settler, the homebound; i'm a taurus, over the line. the bull in the sky is where the pleides is, that group of stars that supposedly holds the black hole. and orion is constantly aiming his arrows there, all winter, for what it's worth. aries, on the other hand, is the pioneer, the explorer, the one who sets out for new stuff, and finds it. so what better cusp could there be? i have no idea, by the way, being unfamiliar with gemini or any of the others, really. all i can tell you is that i feel very much on this cusp, virtually every minute of my life. in some ways, that's what this blog is all about (see notes down the side, on the template).

i found out recently that an old friend of mine, a full professor, has been blogging all these years, and not telling everyone about it. his blog doesn't really hide the fact though; his name, his school, things about him are all over it. we just didn't know. and that goes to show, in many ways, being right out here in plain sight, making rants that everyone sees every day, is far more anonymous, in its own kind of way. i get what, a couple of visits a day maybe. but i'm thankful to blogger; after cesl/siuc shut down everything i've made & done over the years, ning has gone paid/only; i've come to realize, not many things are truly free in this world, besides google and maybe wordpress. and it's been good to me; i know where my life story is (here) and i know how to find it; and, i can even change it. which brings me to my last point. i tried changing my birth year on facebook to 1900; i was tired of commercials already knowing that i was 55 (now 56 btw) so i thought i'd let them assume i was 110 for a while. they wouldn't buy it. even though i'm the admin of my own facebook account, something tripped up their sensors and they wouldn't go for it. ah, so much for i-d alteration. i'm going to start claiming my senior citizen discount anyway. i throw those aarp junk-mail envelopes straight away, ok, but if someone is going to offer me a dollar off, i'll take it. i have ways i'm thinking of spending it.

to the queen, i raise my glass (of coffee)...happy birthday! also to jim morrison, who i've been thinking a lot about lately, and old john muir; also, the guy in alaska. also to hans (?), in winnipeg, whose wife was just on the other edge of the cusp, but then, that's hitler's birthday, and the anniversary of columbine, so i've always wondered how that would have worked out. there's no telling. there are a few more; i've forgotten, for the moment, as the day is so beautiful, so fresh, so stunning, that i can hardly even remember to prepare to teach. i will, though....that's what i do. and i'll come back this way to tell about it.