Mercury in Retrograde

Recently life has been one big stressball.  From home break-ins to car accidents to other stuff, I am ready to throw in the towel.  I am so anxious at this point that my stomach is in knots.

I wrote about the break-in this past weekend in my last post.  I called a guy, Eric, who did some work on our house a few years ago.  He came out Wednesday afternoon, fixed it in 45 minutes, and then said, "Merry Christmas, no charge."  I thought life was looking up and felt grateful for the goodness of humanity.  I was singing a different tune one hour later.

Wednesday night after dinner I decided to take the kids over to the Ballard Commons Spray Park.  It was 78 degrees and Dave was working late.  I loaded the kids in the car and proceeded down the street.  As I neared the end of the block, a white sedan pulled onto the street.  Seeing me, he pulled to the side so I could continue through.  Right as I was moving forward two cars of teenage boys came rearing around the corner, cut in front of the car that was pulled a little to the side and tried to drive through.  I attempted to move out of the way and in the process hit a parked car.  The boys stopped, called me a few names, laughed, said, "Sorry, we tried to leave you some room," and then drove off.  Luckily, two witnesses were there, including the owner of the car I hit.  No one was hurt and I barely did any damage to the other car.  Not so lucky was my car, I dented and scraped the side of my car and tore off half the bumper.  Awesome.

Thursday.  Driving back from swim lessons (we were able to remount the bumper), a semi drove by me on the freeway.  My bumper fell back off and started dragging on the ground.  I pulled to the side of the freeway.  I tried calling Dave.  No answer.  I call my insurance company, they say call 911.  911 puts me in touch with the highway patrol who says they'll send an incident response vehicle.  Call insurance company back.  They say I don't have towing coverage, can't help me call a tow but can give me some numbers.  At this point, my cell phone decides to de-activate itself.  I burst into tears.  Linus from the backseat tries to comfort me.  "It's okay Mommy.  Take a deep breath.  It will help.  Just take a deep breath.  You'll feel better.  It's going to be okay."  A few deep breaths later, my cell phone decides to turn back on, I google towing companies.  The first doesn't answer, the second says they'll send a tow in 3 minutes.  At this point, incident response shows up and he is really nice.  He tells me to cancel the tow. He's got some duct tape and thinks it'll hold.  Ten minutes later I'm back on the road and headed home, where my parents are waiting because I had a hair appointment and they were going to babysit.  Luckily, the hair people didn't charge me for the last minute cancellation and let me reschedule.

The car is going to cost $5200 to fix.  The witnesses back up my story so we just have to pay a deductible.  The insurance companies are considering it a case of phantom driver.  The body shop has to order parts (5 working days) and then it will take 12 business days to fix.  In the meantime, my swagger wagon has a little more swagger as a result of the large amounts of duct tape holding it together.

There are other stressors going on in my life right now.  As someone who likes to be in control, I don't do well fuctioning in the unknown.  My older sister told me that Mercury is in retrograde right now.  I don't follow astrology, but decided to look it up. Here's what astrologyzone.com had to say:

What happens when Mercury retrogrades? You miss appointments, your computer equipment crashes, checks get lost, you find the car you just purchased during Mercury retrograde is a lemon. (Or, you hate your haircut, the lamp you bought shorts out, your sister hates her birthday gift.) There will be countless delays, cancellations and postponements--but know these will benefit you in the long run. Don't fight them, although your frustration level and feeling of restlessness will be hard to cope with at times.

All machinery and things with moving parts--such as computers, VCRs, camera equipment, garbage disposals, and so forth, will reveal any weak links now. It is critical that you back up your data system and be more careful and vigilant than ever. Projects will demand more time and money than anticipated this month.

In matters of the heart, if your boyfriend or girlfriend breaks up with you or says something hurtful, take a wait-and-see attitude. Since Mercury rules speech, they may not mean what you think they are saying now. Let them have some space, and wait to see if they mean in October what they said in September.

When traveling, leave early and allow for extra travel time. Have all bags double-taped closed, count your belongings, double-check addresses and reconfirm appointments. Things get lost when Mercury messes us up. Take NOTHING for granted. The sector of your chart that Mercury happens to be skating through will be effected most dramatically, so check your forecast!

Why would the Universe give us Mercury retrograde? Because to move forward it is sometimes necessary to backtrack and reconfigure our paths in life. It is important to reconsider, repair, reflect, and reconnect. Mercury forces us to slow down and fix what's broken, and in so doing, rethink things. It also gives us time to get to projects we have put on the back-burner. 

Yup.  That sounds about right.  Life is CRAZY right now.  I just need a break.  We are taking a vacation to San Diego soon.  Hopefully, Mercury will be out of retrograde by then.  In the meantime, here is a brief note to the Universe.

Dear Universe,

      Thank you helping me to reconsider, repair, reflect, and reconnect.  I recognize the benefit that this can bring from time to time and I am trying to listen to what you are telling me.  However, I would appreciate you giving some extra special attention to someone else.  I am anxious to move forward with my life path and would greatly appreciate your cooperation in this matter.  Thank you.

Sincerely,

Charlotte