FEBRUARY 2007  

by Susan Pomeroy

The first online edition of Daykeeper came out on September 1, 2000. It was a Virgoan publication from the start: my mother’s Aquarius sun and Virgo moon—serving humanity in a humble, “daily” way, yet with Aquarian intellect and vision—and me, Libra sun with Mars and Venus in Virgo, serving a wider world through helping her publish the journal on the web.

More than anyone I know, my mother could live in the moment. She was always up for a trip, a party, an adventure, a lark, a meal, a treat. And yet her mind was one of the most serious, active and far-reaching I’ve ever known. She knew politics—global, national, state, local—as well as astrology, history, the natural sciences, astronomy, the arts… everything interested her, and she thought deeply about it all. Her home was filled with books, mostly astrology, but also science, ecology, history, biography, fiction, along with countless charts, and pages of notes on current events. She subscribed to—and read—more than 20 magazines, as well as a daily newspaper.

In keeping the days through Daykeeper she brought vast knowledge and sure intuition to bear on the most basic cycle and unit of our lives: each day. And yet each individual day occurs within larger cycles—weekly, monthly, yearly; lunar, solar, galactic. And astrologically speaking, each of us has our individual, personal spot in the cosmic cycles based on when and where we first emerged into the light of this world.

My mother took up astrology when I was in high school. She spent hours pouring over astrology books and doing charts of anyone she could corral. Her children, all of whose birth times she already knew, were convenient research subjects. For years I humored her passion for astrology. I felt an amused tolerance, almost an agnostic acceptance of her immersion in this flaky worldview which nevertheless sometimes seemed very apt. I didn’t “believe in it,” but I wouldn’t actually disbelieve it, either.

Eventually, after many years, and largely through working on Daykeeper with her, I really came to appreciate, not just the insight astrology offers into personality and character, but its amazing predictive abilities as well. So many times, my mother’s travel tips, or Mercury retrograde advice, or predictions regarding political or personal events, actually came true. I began to rely more and more on her guidance.

At heart, I now believe, we each feel alone on this earth. Maybe we don’t feel this first or foremost; maybe we don’t feel it always. But eventually, we come to it. And it’s deep in the heart of that loneliness, that existential uncertainty, that brick wall of ignorance and disconnection, that we seek to connect with something larger. Some source of insight. Knowledge about the future. Inklings of where life’s current is taking us—where it's taking me, myself, individually, and all of us, collectively.

Now, finally, in the lonely aftermath of my mother’s death, I appreciate the magnificence of her efforts. Her monthly writings, offered with sincerity and care, never with even a whisper of a thought of ego or profit, always tried to ask and answer the most basic existential questions: what is our place in the universe, in this world, this year, this month, today? What can I expect; how can I prepare myself for it, how can I best use my energies for growth, for service to humanity, to fulfill my soul’s mission here on earth? How can I have the perspective to ask and seek the best, while forgiving my own and others’ imperfections and foibles… and do it all with a healthy sense of humor?

This enormous perspective, this entire gamut from the ordinary and the minute to the cosmic and sacred, was where my mother lived, and what she offered others. It took her nearly 80 years to grow her mind and soul that big… to become the person who could comfortably encompass this vast array of experience and understanding.

When I imagined carrying on Daykeeper after her passing, the idea seemed ridiculous at first. Preposterous. Yet I could hear her telling me what she told me every year at my solar return reading. “Get the word out.” In comparison with her work for Daykeeper, my offerings feel few and humble. I am not an accomplished astrologer. I never wrote in Daykeeper while my mother was alive, nor, although I am a writer, did I feel the desire to. It was her thing. And yet now, she won’t let me get away with that any more. I hear her clearly and emphatically saying: “write.”

And all I have right now are questions. What I’m wondering, in the wake of my mother’s death, are things like: what is the nature of Time, and why are we subject to it here in this life? What is the nature of Spirit and of our own souls or spirits? Could this life, that seems so fraught with importance and drama, be but the blink of an eye, a moment of striving for something—against the backdrop of a far larger canvas? Is my mother (or are any of the other dead) right here, right now, in some form, as she once promised she would be? Or did she only mean “here” as in, part of my genetic makeup, memories and training? Is my feeling that her spirit persists in another realm and that I sometimes feel connected with her, merely hope, externalized? I wish she and I had talked more about these things. But I could never bear the thought of losing her enough to speak of them.

And is it only in the death of a beloved, or a parent, that we are forced to confront, really confront these questions, and get down to figuring out what we’re deep-down about and what we really think about it all?

“Story,” said writer Ursula Leguin, “is the only vessel we have for sailing on the seas of time.” In the end, and thanks in large measure to my mother, I don’t believe that’s all there is to it. I believe we have other tools and abilities that allow us to tap into larger cyles and energies, and sometimes, to quite successfully navigate the mysterious seas of the future… day by day.

That’s what we’re about here at Daykeeper, and that’s why we’re all pitching in to carry on Maya’s work, even though we know she’s irreplaceable.

And yes, I do think she’s with us.

Stay tuned.