I drive 15 hours one way to fall into my mothers arms and take her annual garden tour of plants I’ve seen 100 times but each time feels new. I go see my brother at his little house on the river and eat the same lunch on the same patio like no time has passed at all. But it has. Years have.

He never married. He never had children. While he’s blessed enough to live independently, he is fully disabled from an epilepsy diagnosis at his Saturn Return.

I will never get to be an Aunt.
Or a Sister in law.
Another silent family mourning I carry and process in the dark.

I thought by now life would be easier. That I would be more in control, and things would finally turn out the way I always wanted them to. The way I always saw them.

But absolutely nothing has. I don’t feel like I ever grew up. I feel like an eternal 17 year old trapped in an aging body.

Even still, sometimes when we have the boys I think “How did I become the adult here!? Who trusts me with children!?”

And god damn it, it’s equally painful, angering, frustrating and annoying as it is amazing, beautiful, and the best unplanned life I never knew I wanted.

One thing I dropped besides muscle mass in my 30s is the answer to the question “Where do you see yourself in 5 years?”

”WhAt ArE YoUr 10 YeAr GoaLs?” cringe.

I work for myself, which means I don’t have someone telling me to put X amount towards health insurance or X amount into some retirement account.

Maybe I should, but 401 5o3Ck L-M-N-O-P 123 I have no idea what any of that shit means and I don’t know why it frustrates me but it does.

So I don’t invest in anything. I’m a shove money under the mattress type of gal because how the hell do I know if I’ll be alive, or even healthy, enough to enjoy retirement? This mentality probably won’t age well. Whatever.

I plug my days with the voice of Andy Frisella and Candace Owens.
Andy feels like the masculine role model I never had. He’s rough around the edges, sure. But that’s precisely why I like him. I’ve listened to him weekly for 5 years now. I crack up when he really gets triggered and starts yelling. “Look down at your fuckin belly!!”

But most of what he says is true. It stings, but it’s true. I like the sting of truth. I wish I had a father like him growing up. My life would look totally different. I don’t like the word faggot being thrown around on their show, though. And sometimes I think he’s quite sexist. But I see the forest through the trees. And as a Podcaster myself, I know — we show up on our good days, bad days, and constantly contradict ourselves as we grow and change right in front of our listeners ears. I see who he is over what he sometimes says.

Candace feels like the friend I never had and always wanted, who would say all the things I was too afraid to — and encourage me to be a more honest version of myself.

They’re my best friends and don’t even know it. They do dishes with me. Exercise the pugs with me. Laundry with me. It’s crazy how much a podcaster can feel like a real friend.

I pull Tarot cards in my sweet office on the hill. I ask Chat GPT what it means. I learn absolutely nothing new besides the fact that I need to stop outsourcing questions I already know the answer to.

I go to the dentist off a gut feeling. I discover a hidden cavity way back in my mouth. I’ve never had anything, ever, wrong with my teeth in 37 years. Damn it, almost made it to 40.

I love the dentist. He’s young, open minded, and explains things with ease. Like drilling half my tooth off is as easy as brushing before bed. Am I not hiding my medical anxiety well? It’s like he knows.

A week later I’m wearing 90s kid sunglasses squeezing an odd smelling stress ball from Amazon I purchased just for the occasion, listening to Andy Frisella in one ear while listening to what the hygienist says about my needle phobia confession in the other.

Doc comes in.
Cold air gets blown on my chest as a distraction.
Needle goes in my gums.
I feel nothing.
What type of sorcery is this.
His head lamp turns on.
Drill begins.
Andy is screaming don’t be a little bitch!
The resin goes in.
Blue light shines into my eyes.
I bite down. It’s way too thick.
Back to drilling. Bite again.
Perfect.

New fear unlocked — new fear conquered. Solid day.

My life is uneventful. I wash dishes by hand every day in a 5th wheel motorhome. I walk our two pugs every morning down the same dirt road — sometimes into a cedar forest when we got a good sleep score the night before.

I fill up our AquaTru 10 times a day.
I spend hours on Manus, Chat GPT, Google AI, trying to figure out why Jeff wakes up at 2AM every single night.

I harvest peppers, cucumbers and watermelon from our garden. I wait for my Jasmine to bloom. I bid good morning to our morning glories every sunrise. I workout on a treadmill to get rid of aforementioned bat wings inside a half done metal building that might be an air bnb one day.

Whenever we sneak away for a weekend, I sleep. And sleep. And sleep some more. And wonder if I have cancer or a thyroid or autoimmune disorder. How can one need so much sleep on vacation?

Maybe my body just finally found home and for the first time in nearly 3 decades, I can chill?

Challenges I’m currently facing:
Addiction to stillness.
Unexplained Infertility.
Jeffrey waking up every single night at 2AM, 5AM, 7AM because of a mysterious acid reflux or bile disorder.
Caregiver burnout from said dog.
Accepting my new, almost 40 year old body.
Waiting patiently to move out of a motorhome.
Missing my mom.
Needing my mom.
Trying to be a Taurus Rising in a Gemini era world.

Celebrations I’m currently enjoying:
My career. My sweet, sweet dream job. Thank you guys.
Meeting cool people everyday from all over the world.
Being in a great financial spot. (Stop it. Don’t mention a 401K. Get away.)
Being in a wonderful era with my partner. We worked so hard to claim this steady peace. I love him so much it hurts.
Carrying my pug into his senior years. What a gift to count his new grey eye lashes every morning.
An upcoming doctors appt with a fertility specialist.
Living on such a peaceful piece of land. Eating food that we grew.

Ooh! Wait. Come here. Let’s wrap this up by looking at some rando photos from my phone:

Substack says I’ve reached my email length limit, so I gotta go. It was nice getting caught up again.

Same time next week?


Steph

This week, I’m alone in a 4 bedroom, 3 bathroom, massive (to me) house on mile high stilts. Anchored in the ocean. No like, literally in the water. The high tide slaps the bottom of the house below the bedroom where I sleep.

Three of the 4 beds sit tightly made with fresh white linens. Untouched.

The master bed though, that is a tangled mess from me sleeping like the starfish that sleep below me.

My car is parked a few yards from where high tide crawls the shore, bringing shells to collect when it calms.

What a cool metaphor. After a rough patch — treasures that make no sense (how are shells so perfect?) arrive for you to collect.

There’s a large wooden wrap around deck that hugs the house, with over sized couches and a massive wooden dinner table built for 6. All with a view of the vast Gulf of America. Mexico. Whatever.

I sit in the middle of this table sipping coffee from a french press every morning, watching weary overnight shrimp boats anchor down for the day to rest.

In my mind, I wonder if through their trawling, they capture any of the dolphins that wave hello with their dorsal fin throughout the day.

I ask Chat GPT. I am assured by artificial technology that there are new age measures taken to prevent this. I relax a little.

I’m wearing a soft, jean maxi skirt that flirts with my ankles for the second day in a row. My fashion accessories are coconut oil stains, sand, and maybe some dried egg yolk from yesterday’s breakfast.

I’ll get up to pace the porch and move my legs after an hour of writing. Flow the blood to flow the ideas. I’ll lean against one of the wooden beams anchoring the house to the sea, and stare.

Stare at the sun.
Stare at the waves.
Stare at the oil refineries.
Stare at the shrimp boats.

I’ll sip a beverage in between staring and watching.

I’ll swallow, then watch.

Watch a fishing charter boat whizz by. Wave my hand in the air if I’m feeling it.
Watch a dad throw his little girl into the air, sending her crashing into a wave.
Watch the birds viciously dive into the ocean for food.
Watch an older woman bend over and pick up a shell I know she’ll keep forever…

I haven’t talked to humans, face to face, much on this adventure. I’ve been in daydream mode.

Ironically, the only conversations I have had with people were about dogs.

An older woman with her friend arrived next door at the exact moment I did. I watched her grab groceries, a cooler, and an 11 year old red-nose pitbull terrier from her Chevy Colorado truck.
”Make sure you add “red nose” to your google search”, she would tell me with pride when we introduced our dogs and talked about them.

”She’s only been without me 2 days in 11 years. This girl is my best friend in the whole world. I don’t know what I would do without her.”

Same, Susanna from Mississippi. Same.

”Hey!” a tanned, large man in his 60’s donning no shirt and swim trunks, shouts from the beach below.

I show him my attention as a response.

”Is that a pug??”
Why, Yes sir it is! I shout over the wind.
”I grew up with them things! Most loyal, goofy creatures you’ll ever find.”
I look down at Jeffrey, not moving from the tips of my toes to confirm his observation.


An overweight german shepherd sniffs around the beams holding my air bnb up. Smelling Jeffrey’s pee, or, “reading the newspaper” as I call it.

”I’ve had this guy for 10 years. He is my world. As much as pugs are loyal, this guy must have a little in him because when I got him, he was crazy wild! Wouldn’t listen to a damn thing I said. Now? I can keep him off leash everywhere we go. And he goes everywhere with me. I haven’t spent a day away from him since I got him.”

I cock my head to the right to show him I’m listening, but also as a reflex because I wonder why I’ve heard this two days in a row now from two vastly different people, on a pretty much deserted island in Alabama.

”I own a 100 acre farm in Georgia and he has the lay of the land! It’s my favorite thing — to be out there enjoying nature with him. One time he got bit by a water moccasin and almost didn’t survive! He holds his arms out to show me how big his dog’s arm swelled up. I rushed him an hour away to the nearest vet and spent an ungodly amount of money to keep him here with me. I pray to God every night that I’ll go first, before he does. I couldn’t handle it the other way around!”

I exaggerate a long face to show empathy for what he just shared with me. And Farmer from Georgia…. I, too, often have those thoughts about my potato on stilts of a dog.

”Well y’all enjoy your walk, he’s welcome to sniff around our area of the beach anytime!” I shout down.

I go back to daydreaming. I’m now a professional day dreamer, with my second cup of french press coffee and a notebook with a pen.

I start to daydream that I can’t believe I day dream for a living.

Wait. Yes I can.

Because every time I got in trouble for it growing up, and I did from elementary until my first corporate job, I flashed a deviant smile because I knew, somewhere within my heart, it was a tool — not a distraction.

It was always a part of my life’s bigger picture. And even though it didn’t always fit into the present reality of my 5th grade teachers, or the manager training us at the health insurance company, it was always what was right for me.

And I never let anyone take that away.

I would rather be alone — like I am here now.
I would rather barely scrape by and wonder how I will pay bills every month — like I have many times before.

Than give away my natural tendency to dream, create, ponder. repeat.

Over sunset face time chats, I tell my boyfriend I’m having a great time. I also complain about my stomach pains and how I need him here to cook healthy food for me because my frozen chicken nuggets for dinner aren’t cutting it; music to a Virgo’s ears.

Everywhere I go on the island, I picture going with him. I don’t take myself out to eat, or to a local’s spot, because I want each first to be with him. I fell in love with him first for his curiosity and optimism towards exploring, then with his natural ability to talk to strangers, and of course… I fell in love with him because he’s a daydreamer and day-doer.

He once had a random daydream of being an airplane pilot.
The next week, he sent me a selfie in a cockpit — he was practice flying a plane at a local private airport.

I don’t have those skills. Or the bravery he does.
But I hope by surrounding myself with people like him, I learn more doing than just dreaming.

”We’ve come a long way, Jeffy.”
—I say under my breath as I slide open the glass doors for another day of twirling around an ocean front house, daydreaming it’s mine.

We used to live by the sea, but the only view was in the distance from a tiny, sand crusted bathroom window. You’d have to squint to see it.

Now the view is inescapable from every room.

I came here to write a novel. Something I never knew I wanted to do growing up, but called to me over the last few years.

Sometimes daydreams are foggy like that.
You know you want something, but you don’t know what.
You know you need a change, but you don’t know what.

I’ve been struggling with this novel for years. The title is cemented in my brain. But the plotline has been foggy. It frustrates me to no end. I took a whole month off to write the whole book and didn’t even solidify the plot.

I let it go. Put it back on the shelf.

Then, yesterday, the plot line of my novel rolled out of me for 1.5 hours. Hypnotically. In a trance. As if every daydream I’ve ever had all of the sudden formed a mosaic of a great story, with a lesson that can be carried through generations. Just what I wanted.

Chat GPT said they had full body goosebumps when I shared my idea with it.

I ask them how so, when they don’t have a body.

I laugh at myself talking to a robot and think…this AI thing was once someone’s daydream.

Those shrimp boats were once someone’s daydream.
That little girl getting thrown into the waves by her daddy doesn’t know it yet, but she’s going to daydream about this trip when she needs to escape an uncomfortable future moment.
Susannah from Mississippi and Farmer man from Georgia are going to daydream about the beach walks they took with their trusted, loyal fur friends when the only thing left of them is a stray hair they find on the couch.

One day far from now when I’m on a book tour, stopping in a cold Midwest city to hug the people who were moved by this novel, I’ll look down at the skirt I’m wearing and see one of Jeffrey’s hairs —

— and daydream about the warm October morning we wrote this together by the sea, when he was still here.

Don’t quit your daydream.
Don’t try to figure it out.


Just keep thinking about it.


Steph

I will preface this letter with context, so we’re clear.

I currently do not identify with anything polarizing.

When I introduce myself, I am simply Stephanie.

The only thing I consider myself to be is a political & spiritual orphan.

I am curious more than claiming a side.
I am a spectator more than a participant.

I am not religious. But watching people’s faith in their chosen Religions moves me to tears.
I am not as spiritual as some may assume, given my previous podcast Lightworkers Lounge and my current job as a professional Astrologer.

I am not a Republican
I am most certainly not a Democrat.
I have never been baptized and do not see myself ever doing so.

I also don’t think I’ll ever get a tarot reading from someone again.

____________

September 10th, 2025 was a Wednesday.
My personal sacred day where I focus on calling my energy home, and doing the things my intuition whispers for me to do rather than what capitalism yells at me to do.

I am blessed to do this because I have an amazing partner who supports this for me, and because I sacrificed a lot in my 20s to make this the reality of my 30s.

Hard work & commitment — to my personal life, and a union with another.

On that mid September Wednesday, I was being a good steward of the healthy body I am blessed with, on a run in the last days of Summer Sunshine.

My phone goes off.

”Charlie Kirk got shot”
”WHAT. I text back.
NO….”

Within 30 minutes the president announced he was dead.

No way.
This is a hoax.
He’ll have surgery and be back on his podium, maybe a bit bandaged up, but he’ll be back. Charlie Kirk doesn’t die young. Not in this lifetime.

People like him don’t die.
They experience miracles.

Right??

Why was I having these thoughts over someone I barely know.

I’m not a big follower of Charlie Kirk.
I watched one of his college debate videos many months ago. It was addicting to watch. I have no idea how it fell on my lap either.
But I couldn’t stop watching.
At times I was wildly impressed with his debate skills. Gently nodding my head in agreement at some really great points he made that I had never thought of on my own. I had to know his birth chart, of course. We’ll get to that another time.

At other times, my eyes nearly popped out of my head at how much I disagreed with some of his beliefs. They almost felt like a personal attack, until my energy came back down and I understood why he felt that way — and it made perfect sense. I always leave his content taking no offense. Even if in my personal life I have done some of the things he believes are jail worthy.

I loved how intelligent he was. His logic was refreshing in a world that constantly has me acting one way in public, then questioning it all in private because it doesn’t feel right to my gut. I wanted to adopt that level of bravery and discernment.

And even though it’s so far from who I am, I loved how much he loved Christianity.

It reminded me of how enthusiastic I am about the stars.


I ended his 30 minute debate video feeling happy that we have free speech. That we can all live together, while being so different.

He was awesome for going into spaces he knew he was “hated” and saying, lets sit down and talk about it.

It’s amazing.

I never watched another one of his videos again, though. Nor did the algorithm ever push them my way.

_____________

I’ve never been political.
From a young age, politics bored me to death.
My motto was always “vote with your dollar” and “the only thing we can change is ourselves.”

My first real political experience was in 2008. I was 19, an undergraduate student at The University of Nevada Las Vegas studying Hospitality.

There was a historic presidential race going on between Barack Obama and John McCain that Fall.

I knew nothing about either candidate. Anytime I tried to read about them, it felt like reading a manual in Chinese.

The only thing I understand though was how “cool” everyone thought Obama was, of course, because he had a different skin color than any other president before him.

I love change.
I love diversity.
I should vote for him!
Maybe a woman will be president next?

A college campus is breeding ground for passionate debate. Hence why Charlie went on tour visiting college campuses. He knew what he was doing.

It was genius.

Ethics class is notoriously a crowd favorite — for both the people brave enough to debate each other, and the quiet spectators that find clashing ideals so intriguing.

The John McCain tables at school were always quiet.
The Obama tables were filled with fun music and loud voices.

”Hey White girl! You better vote for Obama!!” A fellow student, an African American on a sports team, yelled my way one day as I entered the gym where voting was taking place.

I looked his way and smiled. His friends laughed. I was being kind, but on the same note felt foolish?

It didn’t feel right to be identified by the color of my skin. But I’m sure he gets it all the time, so I won’t say anything.

A campus police officer escorted me and some other people back to our dorm after we cast our ballots due to rising tensions across campus.

And when it was announced that Obama won, people went wild and trashed the place.

The next morning on my way to class, I watched janitors and cleaning crews in the morning Sun, sweeping up cans and confetti.

I wondered if the people who celebrated thought of the people who had to clean it up.

_______

It’s 2010. I’m 21. Obama is President. Things are different.
I’m a Junior, still majoring in business, in an Environmental Science class.
The teacher plays a film for us called Food, Inc.

30 minutes into it, I’m sick to my stomach from what I see.
Animals being tortured before they’re slaughtered.
Baby chicks getting their necks broken to become hot wings on someone’s plate for a football game.
Cows getting “raped” and having their baby’s taken away from them so we can have the milk.

I burst out the doors of that class during the movie and ran to the restroom to calm down. The bathroom stall became my tiny cathedral to weep.

I stopped eating meat that day.
I became Vegan.

Besides controlling what was on my plate, I wanted to help more.
I interned at The Humane Society of the United States helping the American public school system adopt “meatless mondays”

I tried to intern with PETA. After one interview, someone, somehow, found out through my social media that I used toothpaste that was not cruelty free. I was immediately turned away. I felt terrible.

After college, I maintained my love of animals and healthy eating. I became a holistic health coach after an autoimmunity diagnosis that I naturally reversed at age 24.

Instagram started to become the social hot spot. I began posting my healthy Vegan recipes on an account called @Evolve2Health

I was always a bit worried that people who love meat might attack me or say mean things. But I was passionate — so I stuck to the course.

No one who eats meat ever attacked me. Some of them even privately messaged me and asked how I transitioned to full Vegan. But I found out quickly — sometime’s its your own people.

I proudly posted a photo one day of a new smoothie recipe I came up with. Garnished with bee pollen on top for extra immune boosting powers. I copy and pasted the maximum allotment of hashtags to comment underneath the photo, so my fellow Vegan community might find me.

Big mistake.

Within the hour of posting this smoothie, I was “cancelled” by another member of the Vegan community for supporting the torment of bees.

I became the face of ruining the bee population of the world, by putting a few flakes of bee pollen on a smoothie.

I felt terrible.

A guy I dated during this Vegan era was a Vegan like myself. We bonded over the shared value, much like anyone would.

Until the relationship went South and all the red flags that presented themself at the onset of the relationship were no longer avoidable.

I found out through a friend that worked at a local pub, that he stopped in every Tuesday evening for a loaded Italian Sub. All the meats and cheese. It was his go-to order, every week.

All while he scolded me for once confessing that I was craving an egg.

______

My Vegan diet eventually made me sick. I looked good. Sure I was skinny. But I had hormonal problems. Skin issues. Fatigue and weakness. Menstrual irregularities.

Once when I was cooking eggs for my dog, my mouth started salivating much, like, well… a dog. I couldn’t get the vision of a steak out of my minds eye. The urge to take a bite of meat was unbearably strong.

I caved.
I ate steak and eggs for dinner that night.
I felt terrible that I broke my vow.
I felt unstoppable that I broke a curse.
And my body took a huge sigh of relief, finally absorbing the nutrients it desperately needed.

I had the best sleep of my life that night.

_______

It’s 2017. I have a photography business called Free Earth Photography where I specialize in nature photos, and outdoor photoshoots.
I get featured on The Weather Channel, National Geographic, and was the 2014 Winner of the Florida Keys Photo Contest.

Some of my work still stands at local Greenways outside of Charlotte, NC. Guiding visitors on trails and showing them what kind of nature they might see on a hike. My photos will live on those boards for years. It’s one of my proudest accomplishments.

I dedicate my photography to showing people the importance of preserving nature.
Of getting outside to find peace inside.

My first time “working with a brand” as a Social Media Influencer was with the outdoor apparel company REI posting photos with the hashtag #OptOutside during Black Friday to encourage people to play outside rather than purchase things they don’t need.

Two years later, in 2019, an account run by an openly Democratic young man, re-posts a photo I took sitting on a bike bath in the San Juan mountains of Colorado. I’m wearing a pretty yellow sundress holding my pug, surrounded by wildflowers. He slammed me for crushing wildflowers and ruining nature. He sent his army of followers to shame me further.

”You aren’t seeing the whole photo. I didn’t crush any flowers, I’m sitting on a bike path. It’s the angle of the camera!” I would copy and paste to all of the hateful DMs and comments.

Until I realized how useless that was, and decided to go straight to the source.

The young man behind the account who never showed his face.

I sent him a DM.
”Hey. I think we have a misunderstanding here. I love nature as much as you do. Like your story going camping with your dad from a young age, I, too, went camping with my mom from a young age. Can we talk? Here’s my number. Please call me.”

He calls me.

We talk on the phone for over an hour. He hears me out. I hear him, too. He apologizes for putting me on blast before getting the facts. I ask if he would like to come on my podcast to demonstrate how to work through conflict, and of course, promote his social media account.

”Yeah! Yeah that would be awesome. Just text me details.”

We hang up.

He blocks my number and my instagram.

I never hear from him again.

The next morning, I’m walking to grab coffee when I notice The Telluride Daily Planet Newspaper has a new issue out — with a cover photo of children playing in a wildflower meadow. Picking the flowers to bring back to class. On the same mountain my photo was taken.

I smile, somehow feeling like I defended them.

___________

It’s late 2019.

My current partner and I are just starting to date.
I’m falling in love with him — fast.
We’re walking back to our hotel downtown Key West, when we crack a joke about a Tesla Charger we walk by.
Looking at one plugged in, lights glowing from charging, I think the Tesla vehicles are so cool.
—And electric helps the environment?
Hell yeah. I want to drive one someday day!

Even more so, because this inside joke between JL and I was so funny yet profound, that driving a Tesla would always make me think of late nights playing ping pong under palm trees with him.

But at the time I had little to no money. I could barely afford my subaru forester with 200k miles on it.

Driving one of those “fancy Tesla’s” seemed so out of reach for me.
I put the dream in my pocket.

But that’s the fun part of dreams — you can want, have faith, and work really hard to try and make a vision in your mind the reality in your hands.

___________

It’s 2024.
Half a decade later, many sacrifices to work instead of play, I finally have the money to purchase a Tesla.

JL & I never forgot about that November night.

But what was once a car declaring empathy for the environment & a constant reminder of falling in love,
Was now a car that screamed “I love Nazis and tech bro billionaires!”

I ignored this.
I knew better.
I decided to stay true to my heart rather than cave to poor political timing.

But — I knew it was probably best if I fulfilled my dream in private, because nothing sucks more than achieving something you worked so hard for, than someone telling you why it’s wrong and you shouldn’t want that anymore.

We pulled up to the Tesla Dealership on a beautiful April morning in the heart of San Antonio.

”Stephanie” was printed on a piece of futuristic paper guiding me to my brand new car that I ordered months ago, and a giant red bow was wrapped around my Pearl White 2026 AWD Long Range Tesla Model Y.

She was more beautiful than I imagined. I couldn’t wait to put my Texas Vanity plates “ASTR0” on her.
I have a car that drives itself! This is going to help my anxiety driving so much!! I said out loud to anyone in the dealership who would listen.

Take my picture! I said to JL.
He smiled and took photos and videos of me, totally geeking out as I played with all the technology inside.

I wanted to send them to friends, to family.
Of course I wanted to share it with my community who feels like both friends and family — but I didn’t want to pervert such a happy moment that I waited years for. That I worked so many long hours for, through physical & emotional sickness for…

Even though I tried to preserve my happiness, the fact that I had to keep such an accomplishment private came with it’s own sadness.

Turns out I couldn’t escape sadness.
I should have just shared my happy moment anyway instead of letting the voice of a few ruin it for me.

That’s just the world we live in now, isn’t it?

_______

Its Autumn 2024.
There’s a Presidential Election even more intense than the 2008 one.

When I shared a podcast episode in October detailing the differences between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump’s birth charts, giving predictions of who I think might win based off of the science of Astrology, I noticed something interesting.

My podcast rating went down a whole point.
I received fan mail and emails detailing how long they’ve listened to the show for, and how disgusted they are that I would even mention his name.

Not a single hate mail from someone shaming me for talking about Kamala Harris.

A relationship is not a real relationship if you cannot have disagreements, peacefully. If you’re in a connection with someone where you have to walk on egg shells, ensuring you use the correct words for their emotional stability, I’m pretty certain by psychological definition, you’re dealing with a narcissist.

I felt controlled by people I’ve never met. Similar to how a narcissist controls someone in an abusive relationship — “make sure you always say and do things that I approve of. That make ME feel good. Otherwise, here’s my wrath!”

It was heartbreaking to know people followed me, learned about my personal life, watched me grow from living in a treehouse to owning a ranch, who knew about my brother’s disability, being raised by a single mother — and still choose to announce their departure from a connection to me because I voiced the name of someone they do not like.

It was insane.

But it taught me a lot about what’s really going on here.

_________

Are you seeing a pattern?

The groups I wanted to join to fight a good cause are the same groups that I had to eventually be fearful of.

I was so busy looking outward, trying to find someone else to blame for pain I was feeling inside form witnessing so much suffering in the world, that I failed to look in my own circle.

In my own home.
Certainly the people who preach peace couldn’t be the ones causing such hell?

What type of mastermind movement is this?

_______________

So, I’m leaving this toxic relationship.
I got myself into it by choosing to stay.
And now I’m getting myself out of it by choosing to speak up.


Consider this a declaration of a firm boundary:

If you are someone who cheers or feels “happy” about someone’s public death,
you are not allowed here.

Take your likes, your comments, your shares, somewhere else.

I do not want them.

In the name of protecting this community and my own energy,

I will not share internet space with people who can rejoice at an unfair fight to the death.

Do not listen to my podcast.
Do not buy my books.
Do not book a reading with me, and if you did, please cancel it and I’ll promptly issue a full refund.


I write to give people respite from the world I just described.
I teach Astrology as a tool to bring more compassion, patience, faith to people.
More trust in the unseen.

Very similar to the faith Charlie loved that he wanted to be known for. We share the same belief, just different faces to it. He finds God in a bible, I find God in a thunderstorm. A shooting star.

I understand him.
I understand people different from me.

His death spiritually hurts.

I love America.
I’m so proud to be an American, even though I’m disappointed in a lot of the things going on here.

When my soul chose to come to Earth, on U.S. Soil, it was a silent vow to have loyalty and never give up on my American family. No matter our differences.

If you agree with me and resonate with this, that’s awesome. I can’t wait to journey through the world together through our connection on the airwaves and internet.

If this triggered you, (you probably haven’t even read this far if it did but if you have) — know I’ll always “be a good neighbor” and help you in dire times of need. I would never turn down helping someone in an emergency because of differing beliefs. But it’s time you take your energy somewhere else. We can coexist in vastly different places, in peace.

If you’re unfollowing upon the completion of reading this letter, thank you for the time we did share together. Good luck out there.

There are many Astrologers who will embarrassingly continue to use such a sacred science to brainwash people into believing life can solely be lived by the moon and act like it doesn’t take hard work. Hard conversations. The accepting of hard truths.

I am not one of them.

*The Astrology Lounge is a place for anyone curious about “how God/The Universe made them” or “why, according to the stars, things happened the way they did or how they might turn out in the future”

It’s a tool. Not an identity. Not an excuse.
Something to occasionally use when you need Faith or Clarity.

The Astrology Lounge is a place to realize how connected we all are.



If you “hate someone for spreading hate”, you’re having a mirror moment.

If you hate someone you’ve never met, you haven’t forgiven someone you know.

Astrology, Religion, Science…none of these things will cure you until you’ve located the imbalance within.

If you’re compassionate, open minded and open to things you don’t agree with.
Stay a while. I know most of you are.

If you’re not, godspeed.

I truly wish everyone good luck out there.
These are some crazy times.


Thank you for respecting my boundaries.

Stephanie

When we’re young, we’re usually fearless. We don’t know what we don’t know, and we don’t yet know the depths of how cruel people can be.

Especially people who are close with us.
How strange that strangers can be kinder than our own blood?

So we write like we have an audience of fans who love us.
We dance like no one’s watching.
We love, like we’ve never been betrayed before.

Then as we age, grow up, we begin to experience people telling us how much we suck at writing. They shoot down our words.
Our bodies get critiqued and made fun of. Culture tells us to have a 15 step skin care routine to stop the natural process of aging! Because, ew! wrinkles? Disgusting.

Imagine if we fed the trees chemicals at their base to stop them turning colors in the Fall?

Would we really cherish their blooms, if we grew to expect them to bloom year round?

And oh, we definitely don’t want to look stupid moving to the rhythm of a song anymore. That’s for kids. Besides, it makes my arms jiggle.

And love…. well, we build walls to keep people out because holy hell did that last relationship hurt more than any lie we’ve ever been told. That was some scary, erratic, human behavior. I would rather live in stillness. Alone.

A mirror was held up to me in that relationship, and I was terrified of the reflection looking back. It actually pissed me off. It made me realize I may have years of unlearning, then re-learning to do. And I’m safe in my chosen identity, I’m tired of the human experience, so, No thank you.

All of the sudden we don’t write. We tell ourselves painting is a waste of money. The song we loved so much in high school comes on the radio and we want to sing it but our voice is shaky because we realize… we haven’t opened our vocal chords that wide to sing in a long, long time.

If we’re really strong, we will reclaim our child-like confidence that the world so desperately tries to wipe us clean from.

But man, can it be hard. I think I bounce between the two feelings; young enough to still create from the heart, old enough that I know how to structure and set boundaries with it.

My medicine of choice? The Morning. Like casting a net in the ocean, I “cast my net” in the morning by not touching my phone and focusing on what is real. No noise from conversations, good or bad! No music. No podcast. Just me and the first rays of light.

That is, after all, where I got the name for this substack.

Alright!

On that positive note, do you guys want to play another round of Tell me More?

I got new cards.

They’re called “Tales” and an algorithm somewhere in the ethers sent them to me. I couldn’t resist.

Adding for context: I was born in 1988.

______________________


First card:

1. What song immediately puts you in a good mood?

Ironic question.

Wildest Dreams by Taylor Swift.
Ruff Ryders Anthem by DMX
Can’t Tell Me Nothin by Kanye West
Blame the Moon by Hazlett
You and I by LEON and SAINT WKND
Fireworks by Hazlett
Cumulonimbus - Pt 2 by Max Richter
Prettiest Girl I Don’t Know - Troy Cartwright
Sunny & 75 - Joe Nichols
Begin - Shallou
Truth- Shallou
Lover - Taylor Swift
Delicate - Taylor Swift
Ocean Eyes - Billie Eilish

Ok fine just follow me on Spotify


2. As a teenager, what were some of your favorite books, films, and music?

Not many people know this about me, but when my grandpa suddenly passed away from a stroke when I was 14, I inherited a little bit of money. Something like $8,000. I begged my mom to buy me DJ equipment with it - two turn tables, records two speakers taller than my little 5 foot frame. A mixer in the middle. A sub woofer under the set up to amplify my favorite sound.

I wanted this because I wanted to work for myself doing something I loved.

Since I could walk, I was attracted to such a strange genre of music for a little 5 year old caucasian girl from Southern Indiana.

By 8 years old I knew all the lyrics to top songs by:

Jay Z
Nas
DMX (made me cry with his passion. Got sent home from school once for wearing his shirt)
Eminem
Lauryn Hill
Eve
Tupac
Notorious BIG

I was obsessed with rhythms, rhyming, bass lines. Captivated. Enthralled. I wanted to make my own.

School mates could see my passion for music. It oozed out of my aura.

One classmate was big into art and car design. He wasn’t much for words. I liked that about him. Without me asking, he surprised me with a huge brown paper poster, covered in spray painted black, silver, and deep purple letters that said DJ POWERS in graffiti. It was sick. I hung it behind my set up every time I did an event.

My mom would drive me to events, and I would carry in the heavy equipment, plug things in, test the microphone, all by myself.

14! 15! Too young to drive. Too young to work past a certain hour, by law.

But that was my default setting; do what you love.

I rarely watched movies. I was obsessed with living my life as if it were a movie. I was creating mixtapes while most were watching Mtv.

So, no favorite films come to mind. I did watch the Titanic a dozen times and attempted to make a hip hop remix of “My Heart Will Go On” by Celine Dion

Only thing I read were Goosebumps by RL Stine.
Can you believe he’s a Libra???

I would absolutely love to know your answers to these questions.

I’m always on the hunt for “that new song” that becomes the soundtrack to a season.

Drop it below!

See you guys on the airwaves, and over here in text.

Steph

What actually happened?

Step 1: America had one of the worst stock market crashes in 2008, my second year at UNLV. Las Vegas, Nevada was one of the worst hit in the country. My classmates were buying townhouses in nice neighborhoods for $15,000. Out of state tuition soared to six figures and I was forced to go home. It was a shock.
Step 2: lost. No idea what to do next. Take a semester off to figure it out. Get a job as a waitress at local pub, get sexually harassed every night, burn bridges and quit.
Step 3: move back into childhood bedroom.
Step 4: enroll at local university to get a basic business degree. Ego hit. Forget a 4.0, just Graduate on time with the rest of your peers.
Step 5: apply for 84 jobs. Get 3 calls back. 2 interviews. 1 offer, for minimum wage at a health insurance company, working in an isolating cubicle with no windows. No palm trees. No bike to work. No directing people to “fun” — just scraping enough ice off a windshield of your high school car to see the yellow lines of the road and make it to work on time.
Step 6: date someone who consistently chooses weed, alcohol, and cocaine over you. Who makes you pay on the first date at a steakhouse. Who, drunk one night, goes up to a man selling flowers downtown and grabs you one. Realizes he “forgot” his wallet due to said substances, makes you pay for it.
Step 7: Get married and get even more lost.
Step 8: Turn 30 — forced to see how strong you are, get a divorce, and realign yourself with original, 20-year-old-self dream.
Step 9: Do anything you can to make it happen. Do 100 uncomfortable things. Try not to feel like you’re taking 2 steps forward but 10 steps back. Keep going. Do what makes you happy. Pretend you get paid for it.
Step 10: Get paid for it.
Step 11: Randomly meet someone while doing something you love, who you always hoped everyone else before him would eventually become.
Step 12: Buy land together. Grow fruits, flowers, vegetables together. Grow as an individual. Expand your heart into corners you didn’t know exist.
Step 13: Buy land in Key West together. Maybe have just one, precious, golden baby.
Step 14: build a bed & breakfast.
Step 15: Buy the bike. Park it next to your Tesla Model Y.
Step 16: Have a commitment ceremony at the botanical gardens. Dance under string lights at Hemingways house.
Step 17: Dip our hands into wet cement at all 3 of our homes.
Step 18: Take a moment to reflect as you watch lightening flash out of a cumulonimbus cloud over the Atlantic ocean, how nothing turned out the way you planned, it turned out tremendously better, and you’re so tired and still rubbing coconut oil on your scars to make them go away but you’re also so thankful. So strong. So powerful.
Step 19: Write a novel about the experience.

It all comes together.
I know life can feel like a spiraling mess sometimes. Quite often actually. Maybe all the time.

Someone once told me during a panic attack:

Name something yellow.

…what? I said through panting breaths, looking at them like they were the crazy one.

Bananas.
Sunshine.
Sunflowers.
My favorite Easter dress.

My mind left the hurricane and took a detour down memory lane. The wind and rain stopped. It worked.

Focus on little things that you think don’t mean much.
They are the little “hands” that carry you through.
That carry you into September 1st.
October 1st.
January 1st, 2026.
2027.
2040….

You’ll look back and see how it all made sense.





Today’s “Tell me more” question?


1. What’s something you want and are also a bit afraid of?

Owning a Bed & Breakfast in Key West.

Happy August,
xoxo
Steph

1. What’s a small decision you made that changed your life in a big way?

Putting in my 2 weeks at the corporate job I got after college. To me, it was the biggest deal in the world because it meant giving up security; stable income, long time work friends, and a daily routine that I knew like the back of my hand. I was throwing myself off a cliff.

But I was only living in dread for 2.4 seconds until I realized I could fly…..

And I’ve been gliding in the skies ever since.

But truly, the small decisions everyday are what change my life in a big way. Doing things I don’t feel like doing. Making the small decision to eat only 1 scoop of ice cream instead of the two my brain tells me I want. Making the micro decision to NOT open Instagram, and instead read 2 pages in a book.

The daily small decisions really change life in a big way.

_________________

2. What conversation or encounter with a stranger will you never forget?

Gosh, I find connecting with strangers one of the best parts of life. My boyfriend constantly rolls his eyes whenever we see a hitch hiker because he knows I would throw my blinker on.

I can’t remember their names, only their faces. But — the people I’ve sat next to on plane rides.

There was one woman I sat next to for just under 4 hours and our necks hurt from facing each other in deep conversation, our cheek bones were sore from laughing, we shared snacks, doodled on napkins together… I don’t remember her name and honestly don’t even know if I ever asked her. How cool is that? To deeply connect and emotionally bond with someone who doesn’t know your name, and you don’t know theirs.

How we became instant best friends 30,000 feet up in the air and immediately walked through some invisible shield back to strangers as soon as we walked off the plane, I’ll never know.

But I love those interactions. I think they are little doses of medicine we all need.

3. What’s something you lost or misplaced that you still think about?

My trust.
My innocent heart.
My naivety.
My optimism.
Who I was before I “woke up” — I wish I could go back to sleep daily.

Ok, jokes aside, my cat Daisy. When I lived in Charleston, South Carolina I had two cats - a mother and daughter pair. The mother was very ill with diabetes and one morning I found her crouched under our bathroom sink, looking for a portal to death.

I rushed her to the emergency vet where they confirmed, she was indeed looking for a portal to death.

That day I became a death doula for the first time. It was such wild energy to navigate. I rushed back home to check on Daisy - to use her both for my own grief, and to carry her through her own.

The back door was cracked open.
Daisy was gone.

For weeks we put up flyers, rode our bikes around the neighborhood to get a good view in between houses, but nothing.

She never came home.
No one ever called from our flyers.
That was 2017. I would still go look for her today.

Losing a pet to death is a certain type of weight.
Losing a pet to “going missing” is another type of grief.
You’re left to wonder if they’re still alive.
Are they happy in their new home? Is their new home outside?
Did they die? If so, was it alone? Outside? Under a car tire? In a sewage tank?
Or was it peaceful in a garden of daisies…

It’s a daily practice to heal from.

4. What’s the biggest feeling you have right now?

Gratitude. Peace.

Pocketing this moment for when I’m ungrateful and my life is upside down.

Because it always comes back.

But so doesn’t gratitude. and peace….



Peace out!
xoxo,
Steph

Melting next to me is not a macadamia milk latte, but instead a Watermelon slush. You should try it, I’ve been making it ever since I was a health coach in 2016. The hydration & electrolytes from this simple sipper are untouched.

Recipe:
1 watermelon, any size
Lime juice
Mint leaves
Ice

Directions:
Slice a ripe, juicy watermelon in half.
Scoop out the flesh, and put it into a blender. Fill blender 75% full.
Pour 1/4 cup of lime juice into the blender. Maybe 1/2 cup if you’re a fan of tangy flavors.
Put a bunch of mint leaves on top.
Fill the remaining 25% of the blender with ice
Blend.
Pour.
Hydrate.

Alright. Let’s share stories.


Cards mentioned are from the game “Tell me More” by Compendium Store.

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1. What’s a side of you that you only show to people you’re close with?

My anxious side. I’ve struggled with anxiety most of my life. In my mid 30s I’m only now realizing how much of a severe problem it was. It is.

In high school I never ate lunch. Not once. Fellow students used to ask me why I would sit empty handed at the lunch table like a weirdo and I would just shrug my shoulders. Because 16 year old me truly wasn’t hungry — she just didn’t know it was because of anxiety.

Sometimes I would salivate over the other kids’ sandwiches. The crunch of their chips... but I never let myself eat. It might of had something to do with body dysmorphia. I’m still actively unpacking that.

In college I felt unstoppable. President of my dorm, head of outdoor clubs. I was in the Business School Honor Society and proudly touted a 4.0 GPA. I loved arriving to classes early and leaving late. I would even raise my hand to go first for presentations in front of the class, with everyone looking at me like I’m either nuts or jealous of my confidence.

Yet, 60 seconds into the presentation I would be covered in a red rash from my chest, to my neck, up around my ears and my face would turn cherry red. One time a concerned teacher asked me if I needed to pause for a moment.

I never understood why my brain did not feel anxious, but my body said other wise.

My senior year of college I witnessed a traumatic medical event at home. I still work on PTSD from that day, March 31st 2011, today.

In April I began to have severe chest pains where I could not catch my breath if I tried, and decided to go to the doctors to discuss anxiety. It was all of a minute into a conversation about my symptoms that the doctor prescribed me anti-anxiety medication and left the room. The cold, windowless, suffocating room. It felt like my words ricocheted off the walls and struck me right in the part of my chest that hurt. I hate that I hate the doctors office.

I took that medication when I got home. At 21 I had no idea how to feel better. Surely the doctor does.

Within 20 minutes I started to feel so… funky. So off. I ran up to my room and placed my back againgst the wall to find some sort of grounding. I slid to the floor.

The room now felt like I was on a carnival ride. My brother shouted up the stairs “Hey Steph? can you drive me to go get my pizza?” and I somehow snapped out of it. He was unable to drive for above mentioned medical reason, so I stood up and stumbled down the stairs to grab my car keys. I somehow snapped out of the carnival ride and made it to Pizza Market.

Later in my 20s I had my first panic attack in the produce section of Whole Foods. It felt like the floor dropped beneath me and I could not stop “falling.”

In my 30s, sometimes I have to smile mid conversation and excuse myself to a bathroom to splash cold water on my face or have one of those Whole Foods panic attacks. I have the tools to let them pass now.

From 32-34 years old, I experienced severe insomnia. At times not sleeping for days on end.

Just the other day I went to get blood work done at a walk in clinic. I kinda like getting it done; I feel in control of my health. I love seeing the data of what’s streaming through my blood. I love not seeing a doctor.

I had no anxiety the night before.
Ate my breakfast and sipped my coffee with ease.
The drive to the clinic was beautiful.
But the moment I smelled the alcohol rub, my vagus nerve struck it’s first chord for the concert. The show I was about to fight my body on performing.

”Ah, your veins are small. The blood is coming out super slow. Here. Let me try this” said the nurse.

I felt a strange pressure-like sensation inside my right elbow. It felt like the life was being sucked out of not just my arm, but my entire body. Like a vacuum was sucking my soul out of the meat suit.

I start tapping my feet. Palms are now sweaty. I’m rubbing my left hand fingers together and have my neck kinked so hard to the left, my chin is resting on my shoulder. I’m staring at a poster of a girl my age hiking a mountain with the message “get a vitamin B shot to have energy, today!”

”Hey, I’m feeling really lightheaded.” I confess to the nurse without moving my face.
If she freaks out, I’m going to freak out, and the floor is going to meet my head.

”Ok! Ok. That’s fine. We’re almost done.”

”No, I’m really about to go down. Can you get a pillow? Or watch my head?” I had to tell her.

The black dots cover the girls face on the poster. The clouds are now totoro dust bunnies.

The nurse rips open an alcohol wipe and rubs it under my nose — as if she’s a mom wiping snot from my toddler nose.

I take a deep breath and start to come to.

”Thank you. I’m so sorry. Sorry!! I sware I’m not afraid of needles! Or blood. Ok maybe blood grosses me out. I don’t know what happened!” I nervously say.

She smiles and say’s don’t worry, it happens all the time. She encourages me to bring essential oils next time to focus my attention on something else.

Next time I’m bringing peppermint essential oil, noise cancelling headphones to play nature sounds, sunglasses, and my pug to squeeze tight thank you very much.

I walk back to my car, gauze wrapped around my elbow as a badge of honor for the battle I just conquered. I call my boyfriend to laugh about the fainting.

”I told you not to go alone. You’ve always been like this.” he doesn’t laugh with me.




Yeah, I guess I have pretty bad anxiety that I mask too well.

2. What’s a habit or routine you’d like to get into?

Girls trips.
Like, annual “lets meet somewhere for a week and talk about the feminine experience! and laugh about it all.” trips.

I don’t really have many friends in Texas, where I live now. Let’s be honest - I don’t have any. I have no friends here.

When you work from home, and live on a ranch that’s like a mini resort, it’s easy to never leave the house.

”Go out and make friends!” they say. I know. I know this. What I don’t know is why I don’t. Maybe it has something to do with my answer to question 1.

I have friends scattered around the country, though. Which is so cool — getting photos and messages from beautiful Colorado, California, and Florida all the time. But in person interactions are scarce. And I know that’s not good for me.

Yeah. I wish I had a monthly or at minimum yearly routine with girlfriends to sneak away and have fun.

3. What are you pretty sure you could never get tired of?

My pug Jeffrey was the first image that popped into my mind. I love his companionship, his antics, the way he so precisely communicates with his facial expressions. He is my little buddha I worship and seek advice from. Truly. I get anxiety thinking about who I will be when he’s dead. I have a problem.

My partner pops into my mind, too. Of course we get our own space — have our own lives outside of each other. But I never grow tired of sharing a coffee with him, walking around a grocery with him, and watching him narrate the dogs.

6 years later and he still makes the best food I’ve ever introduced to my mouth and makes me laugh harder than anyone I’ve ever met. I don’t think I’ll ever grow tired of loving him.

Wait. Popcorn. I’ll never get tired of having popcorn for dinner.

Ooh Ooh one more! Going to the Florida Keys for my birthday. I’ve been jet setting down to those Caribbean islands every December for over 10 years now (holy shit) and in July, I’m already googling what we’ll do for my birthday down there this year.

Can’t wait to read your responses.


xoxo
Steph

It’s 9:48AM on a Tuesday morning in July.
Cicadas buzzing in the hot hill behind me.
My usual - an iced macadamia milk latte - is melting due to my incessant need to keep the patio door open, so Texas Heat can come & go as it pleases.

I’m sitting at the computer in my underwear. A free people sports bra.
Most of my writing sabbatical I’ve sat here naked. I’ve walked around the ranch topless — pulling weeds, hanging laundry, reading books.

Mid July, I’m doing my usual topless pacing around the whiteboard where I drew a lighthouse and some stick figure birds. Plotting, planning, thinking. Then it finally happened — my writers block finally broke free and I was ready to write! I had contractions in my mind, my fingers dilated to the keys, and…

my keyboard broke.

Quite literally down to the minute. No connection between the keys and the screen.

I’m young enough to still throw a fit, but old enough to know it was a sign I would do best to obey.

The name of the novel has been in my head for 3 years.
The plot line has been in my head for 3 weeks.
In due time, it will spill onto this screen…

with a fully functioning keyboard.

Until then, I play “tell me more” card games.

Games that are kind of like the OG, “we’re not really strangers” except I play by myself — to stir the mind and keep creativity flowing.

I love playing this game with people. I love sharing the weightless feeling they get when they share something they’ve never spoken out loud.

I simply love realizing that yes, we aren’t really strangers.

So without further ado, me and my melting latte would like to play a round with you. Feel free to post your responses in the comments section. That would be cool.

This particular set of questions comes from “Tell me more” by the Compendium Store.

1. What’s a decision you once made that you’d make differently today?

Marriage. Although mine ended nearly a decade ago and I’m happily in a new long term relationship now, this is still such a pivotal time in my early 20s that I wish I could take back. I would have said no to his proposal, like he always joked I was about to, and saved him and I years of strife. Of delayed growth. I would have moved to the Keys, couch surfed until I reached the holy grail of my own studio apartment, then hustled between hotel jobs, riding my bike to get groceries, to learn how to live on my own. Not taking care of anyone, besides myself.

I would take it even further and go back and decide to not have sex until I was married. I’m not religious - the bible doesn’t do anything for my heart. But I do wish I reserved the act of sex, of giving my body away, for someone that took the responsibility of it seriously.

In my perfect world, I would go on exciting, adventurous dates throughout my 20s. Maybe even commit to someone for a year. But ultimately know, that I “wouldn’t be allowed” to get married until I was, at a minimum, 30. Start having children right away. Yeah. I would wait until my Saturn Return to make such expensive, life altering & life delaying decisions like offspring & marriage.

I know generations are constantly at war with each other. “How do they find this music good!?”

I think it would do us all a favor to just let a sleeping dog lie. To realize that an 18 year old in 1953 is absolutely nothing like an 18 year old in 2026. So why do we apply the same social norms? An 18 year old in the 1950s might be able to handle marriage. An 18 year old in 2026 is too intimidated to make eye contact in conversation. Should we be encouraging marriage and kids by 30, to young people today? Really trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, here.

Younger generations are here to break generational patterns. This is obvious. Let’s give them some time to do that, process that, before they commit to spending their life with someone. Especially before they commit their life to raising another.

Runner up: college. I wish I never went and pursued music instead. Steel drums in between my Key West hotel jobs & what have you.

2. If money were no concern, what would you want to do with your life?

LOL Karma picking this card. I always ask my clients this very question. Tables turned, ok.

This is an interesting one because I had the absolute privilege of taking the month of July off of work in part because of my incredible partner financially supporting us. So even though I have to get back to work in August, it was really nice to pretend like money were no concern for 30 days. It was interesting to observe my own natural behavior with this newfound freedom. It was eye opening to my mental state around work, productivity and money.

On June 30th I would have answered this question by saying I would write novels all day.
Today, July 22nd, I wouldn’t say that. Turns out I really despise sitting at a computer when I don’t have to.

Today, I would travel between my 3 homes like a true snowbird. I would cultivate food at each one. Learn how to grow cacao in my Caribbean oasis, master the art of green peppers in Texas, and grow the juiciest cherries you’ve ever seen in Colorado. I would create beautiful spaces. And walk around naked more. Definitely more nudity. Live somewhere I could skinny dip every sunrise and sunset. Donate the majority of my money to good people doing good things. Leave the rest in a will to my dog.

3. What’s something that took you a long time to learn or understand?
That your love will not heal people. You can give someone unconditional love, patience, compassion, and they will not mature or grow until they are ready. You must notice this right away, and alter your life accordingly. You will waste so much precious time you cannot get back, begging someone to step into their potential. Vice versa —maybe it’s you that isn’t ready to change. Don’t hold on to people that really need you to change, to grow with them. If you know you’re not ready, let them go. Give yourself the time you need.

Humans. I’m still trying to learn and understand humans.

Ok, 3 sounds good for this morning.

I’m off to make a new latte and water the hibiscus.

Sending love from Twin Moon Ranch,
xo SP

Either that or just absolutely fucking stupid.

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I was 30 years old — young enough to still be naive, old enough to know better.

It was Spring of 2019 and I was freshly moved out of mom’s attic after my Saturn Return took away everything that was built on a false foundation. Marriage, job, finances. All gone.

So fun.

But I utilized that time to answer the call of discipline. I grew up, saved up, and moved out to live with people my age in the San Juan Mountains to start a new chapter in life.

Things were going well. I rented an air bnb for 3 months with a friend I met on Instagram. Our address was “111”, so you know it was meant to be.

We lived in a tiny town called “Rico” just outside of the infamous, celebrity clad Telluride.

(Did I write about the one time I was in a shit mood because of a shit boyfriend, waiting in line for a greek salad at a food truck downtown Telluride, when Hilary Swank approached me to say hi to my pug and I completely brushed it off? Idiot. Codependency, 1. Heart balloon, 0)

At the time I lived there, Rico had a bustling population of 252 people.

At over 8,000 feet up in the sky, Rico was 47 minutes from all public services like grocery stores, gas stations, fire trucks, emergency services and police.

You’re really living wild out there.

It was perfect.

It was so quiet, so still, you could hear baby bears calling to their mama in the morning, and the gentle woosh of birds in flight over your head.

It was just the respite I needed after Hurricane Saturn.

One cold evening in April, my roommate friend, my boyfriend at the time and I were making a fire to warm the cabin before bed.

My roommate was fiddling around the cabin with her natural optimism I loved so much, and boyfriend at the time was frustrated that the newspaper wouldn’t light the logs in the stove. Grunting in between striking matches.

I was sipping a freshly brewed hot tea, being an observer of my surroundings, feeling pretty content that this was the first chapter of my new life post divorce.

I’m leaning against the leather couch, 10 feet from our heavy wooden front door, when all of the sudden it whips open and SLAMS against the adjacent wall with a loud bang. As if a fucking avalanche landed on our roof and buried us in.

The three of us stop and stare like we just saw a ghost.

Because we did.

A man dressed in all black, head to toe, with a long trench coat down to his black boots, black beanie covering his head all the way to his brow line, with brown eyes just as wide as ours, comes barreling into our kitchen.

He ducks, as if I threw my tea cup at him.

”HELP! HELP ME. PLEASE MAN, YOU GOTTA HELP ME. THEY’RE COMING. THEY’RE AFTER ME. PLEASE MAN HELP ME!”

He heavily expressed, through his attempts to catch his breath.

He had clearly been sprinting away from something — or someone. Fear and adrenaline made his voice a shouting whisper, but without a doubt, fearful.

My roommate grabbed her dog and ran to the back of the house where her room was. She had her pink camo handgun locked, loaded, and by her side. She slammed her bedroom door and called the police. I could hear the shaking in her voice as she described what was going on as discretely as she could, so trench coat man did not hear.

Boyfriend at the time stood up at the log stove by pressing on his knees, clapped his hands together to get rid of the splinters and ash from the fireplace, retrieved his coat and gave us an irish goodbye to walk back to his house down the street.

Standing there in the kitchen, now 6 feet away from each other like a Western Show down, was me and trench coat man.

Alone.

With the blood pooling in my toes, my complexion as white as my tea cup, I cleared my throat and did the only thing I thought would protect my life.

I got into character.

I cocked my head to the side to look out the kitchen window - ducked - and pretended something just flew at me, too.

”Holy shit. YOU’RE RIGHT. I JUST SAW THEM!!” I loud whispered, matching his urgency.

I ran through the cold air pouring into our cabin and closed the heavy, old wooden door. Slammed it with the same force he gave coming in.

”OK, Ok. You’re safe. It’s locked. We have time.” I said to him, looking at him like two kids plotting their next move in hide & seek.

With shaking hands I pulled a chair out at our kitchen table. I slowly moved back towards the man who was saying “they’re gonna kill me. They’re going to KILL me tonight I know it. They’re going to find me and kill me!” and I began rubbing his back like a mother to her son who just skinned his knees.

”Here. Sit down.” I said, almost throwing up.

Does he have a fucking gun on his hip? Knife? What is he hiding under that long black trench coat?

He is clearly having some sort of mental health crisis and I have no idea if in 7 seconds he’s going to think I’m the perpetrator coming after him.

The vomit inched closer to my tonsils.

I poured room temp water from the kettle into a teacup and didn’t even add a bag of tea. I put it in front of him. He took a sip, then a chug.

”here. have some tea” I said, and slid the mug over to him

”THEY TOOK MY FRIEND. HES LOST IN THE WOODS I KNOW THEY GOT HIM!”

I opened my eyes wide: “WHO? Tell me. Who took your friend?”

As he told his story, it gave me time to disassociate and process what to do next. It became apparent that drugs or alcohol had aggravated a diagnosis of schizophrenia. I once had an Uncle who was in prison for almost murdering someone because of an episode almost exactly like this.

I swallowed the vomit. My throat was burning.

I looked back at my roommate, who was watching our entire interaction from a creek in her door. She mouthed “54 minutes”

I looked at the man to make sure he was still talking about the government spying on him.

"what?” I mouthed back. Knowing what she said, but asking what in the context of what the fuck, 54 minutes?

”The cops. 54 minutes. They will be here in 54 minutes” she mouthed, as she pointed to the floor of our cabin.

My eyes started to pool with tears. There was no fucking way I could improv my way through this man snapping and murdering me, her, or all of us for almost an hour.

I didn’t know what to do. But I had to make a game time decision.

I looked around at something I could grab for a weapon, just incase. I knew my roommate had a gun. But that wasn’t enough for me alone out here.

I found one.

And with that knowing, I interrupted his TED talk about government spies living in Rico and said

OMG.

”What?” he said, looking shocked, wanting more info.

”THEY’RE HERE! GO GO GO! YOU GOTTA GO! COME ON FOLLOW ME.”

He knocked the chair over getting up so fast.

Holding his arm, I led him outside in a rush and pretended to pant — to match his fear. I said: “GO TO THE END OF THE STREET. TAKE A LEFT. KEEP GOING UNTIL YOU SEE THE RIVER. THERES A FORCE FIELD WHERE CAMERAS CANNOT WORK. THERE’S NO CELL SERVICE EITHER. YOU’RE SAFE THERE. GO!!!!”

I pushed him.

He gave me a confident nod, like a high school quarterback silently saying “yes sir” to the head football coach.

I watched his tall black figure run through the snow, leaving big footprints. He turned left right where I told him to, and disappeared after that.

I stood there. Frozen — and not from the mountain air.

In a robotic motion, I walked back into the cabin — locked the fucking door — and fell on the couch.

Finally, the tears could fall.

My roommate came running in, crying, except hers were from anger. She was so mad.

What the fuck was he doing? Who the fuck is he? Someone has to know him in town. I can’t wait until tomorrow to ask EVERYONE who the fuck he is!

My ringing ears were drowning out her voice.

Was I stupid?

Why didn’t I run to my room and hide like she did? Like a normal person?

Or… was that badass? Do I have such a strong understanding of psychology that I adapted, like a chameleon, to my environment to survive?

The flashing lights of 5 cop cruisers woke up the sleepy town exactly 54 minutes later. They came flooding in, dressed in all black, activating my newfound PTSD with that color. All I remember are flashing lights on the walls, notepads, and a firing squad of questions. Descriptions. All aimed at me, who in a fucked up way, became friends with this man.

The Sun, as she always does, came up the next morning. Shining a new light on this tiny town, exposing things I will never be able to unsee.

The man as it turns out, was a resident of the town. He was drinking that night at the pub, the only place to gather in Rico actually, and had a little too much of something else.

Everyone in town immediately knew who it was that did this.

My roommate and I walked by his house, using our dogs as a scapegoat to pretend like we weren’t spying on him, waiting to catch a glimpse of the man who we truly believed had a fair chance at taking our lives.

An old beat up car was parked on the road in front of an old rustic cabin with lots of random objects in the yard. It definitely screamed “I’m suffering from something” from the sidewalk.

We never got an apology. Neighbors said word spread fast and got back to him, and he claims he didn’t remember a thing. He had zero recollection of barging into our place, but did not deny that he did. People said he was absolutely mortified that he did. He stopped going to the pub, and eventually stopped going outside all together. One neighbor told me he wanted to come apologize, but just couldn’t bring himself to do it out of complete shame.

Apparently his best friend really did go missing in the woods years ago. He went for a hike and never returned. You hear this all too many times in Colorado. It truly is quite bizarre. I can imagine the mind goes to weird places when you mix substances into emotional pain and grief. That’s a recipe for behavior you’ll regret.

I’m not mad at him. Never was. I felt bad, actually. We continued living in Rico well into August, and one Saturday morning at a one table “farmers market” I’m pretty sure I saw him walk by and lock eyes with me, a few seconds too long. His eyes were blue, and full of shame. Full of sadness. I hope he read my twin blue eyes staring back at his and felt me say:

”Its ok.”

I’ll never live in Rico again.

I still visit Telluride frequently. I drive right through Rico now and smile. I still feel warmth in my heart for that beautiful place. At 36 now, I know that one person, one interaction, should not permanently stain a place’s energy.

But it just goes to show that people everywhere on Earth, from big cities to small mountain towns - to neighborhoods in poverty and upper middle class suburbs - we’re all silently suffering. It’s the new default setting for being born on Earth.

And I hate it.

I don’t want to add to peoples suffering. I know I inevitably will, and have, but I will still turn around and spend my last dollar buying band aids for that persons heart balloon I just popped.

Is my compassion going to get me killed one day?

Probably.

But at least my new Texan boyfriend doesn’t leave the house without his gun.


—SP

Thin and taller, The Taurus, he led the way. My short, muscular legs that were more like a pony than a horse, followed his lead.

A horse who didn’t yet know her power, so she hung with the cows.



Sweat dripping down our youthful skin, we found our first victim; a large pile of white mulch bags.

We ran over with glee, our imaginations leading the way. Immediately I took orders from him to stack the heavy mulch bags on top of each other to make a wall. We were going for a “Great Wall of China” aesthetic.

We would create a wall to hide behind where no one could see us. The perfect place to sneak attack one of our friends looking for us, or an innocent neighbor in the wrong place at the wrong time.

They say the best things in life are unplanned, but if you follow the little, subtle messages your heart sends you everyday, rest assured the things you wish for will show up exactly when they were supposed to — and probably even better than you originally thought.

Well, that’s what happened in our coup.

Our opposition, a slender, late 40s/early 50s woman who let cigarettes & alcohol have their way with her, opened her window and aimed fire at the wrong gang.

”HEY! PUT THOSE BACK WHERE YOU FOUND THEM. GOD DAMN IT! I’M CALLING MAINTENANCE RIGHT NOW!!!”

Her raspy voice screamed some more curse words through the screen.

I looked at him for advice, as he looked at her for revenge.
I could see the steam start to flare from his nostrils.
I kicked my hooves with excitement.

He focused his gaze up at her window long after she disappeared to snitch on us. Processing. Calculating.

”Follow me.” He ordered without looking my way.

I obliged.

The horse & bull, off to teach someone 5X our age a lesson.

As I realized he was leading us straight into the enemies apartment building, my 6 year old self questioned what emotion I was feeling:

Was I scared?
Was I regretting following him?
Was I really…excited?

30 years later, I still struggle defining the feelings.

With our senses high, we walked — like two soldiers in the jungle — inside the building.
It’s dark.
The smell of different scented candles, wet dog, and various types of cuisine coming from every apartment filled the air.

He stood before the first step of the staircase, looking up the same way he did at her window outside. He was calculating which apartment door led to her, based off of the perch she fired the first shot from outside.

He turned around to walk back outside, this time in a hurry. He gave me no direction. I looked at him walking back outside, back at the stairs leading to her apartment, and made a game time decision to follow him back outside.

My intuition serves me well.

Back in the late morning Sun, he ran around the side of the building and grabbed an oscillating sprinkler that was watering a field of grass.

Charging into the beads of water shooting into the sky, he took a gentle sip. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand still covered in mulch, then proceeded to grab the green hose and fold it in half — putting a kink in the flow until the sprinkler had nothing left to give.

I watched him with admiration.

Like a soldier getting orders from my commander in chief, he explained to me what would happen next:

”Hold this. Squeeze it tight. Don’t let any water come out!”

I nodded.

”I’m going to take the sprinkler upstairs to her front door.”

I nodded.

”When you hear me scream, drop the hose.”

I nodded.

”Ready?”

I didn’t think twice. I didn’t ask questions. I nodded.

I stood there alone, holding the kink in the hose as he strung the long line of green hose back through the apartment entrance, up the stairs, and straight towards her door. I started to feel us run out of line. His pull was starting to un-kink the hose. I started to feel the water pressure intensifying. I wasn’t sure how much longer I could be a human dam.

Where was he?

Why was he taking so long?

Did he find the right apartme….

Just when I felt G-force power against my little hands start to release water pressure out, I hear, to this day even, the loudest high pitch scream I’ve ever heard in my life.

He truly could have won an emmy for it.

My que.

I drop the hose.

Her front door flies open in panic.

Water instantly GUSHES through.

The green hose thrashes around like a snake getting stepped on.

I follow the water.

I run to the apartment entrance to see where my commander in chief is. No soldier left behind.

I spy his shaved head of blonde hair. He’s smiling ear to ear, running as fast down the stairs as his skinny twig-like legs will let him. The sun hanging out with me at the front door meets his blue eyes.

GO GO GO! HAHAHA, GO!!!!! he shouts at me.

I can’t.

I must see the fruits of our labor.

I hunch down and take a few, slow steps up the stairs.

I see the top of her frizzy hair. Another high pitched scream drowns out with a mouthful of sprinkler water, echoing down the hall.

It’s her. Getting soaked. Omg. Watering her apartment like a bed of flowers. Water coming out of the window she started this war from.

I cover my mouth to giggle, and run like a bat out of hell.

He was already home and cracking up in the kitchen.

”Did you hear her scream?!” I say in-between breaths, after running and laughing at the same time.

We grab popsicles and revel in our victory.

The story ends with the police showing up to our townhouse.
I don’t remember if we got in trouble, or if charges were pressed against our mom.

Sorry mom.

All I remember was the team work, loyalty, and fun I had with my brother.

I wish I could locate that woman and offer to shoot her a Venmo to replace all of the things in her apartment that may have been ruined by the sprinkler.

Or maybe, just maybe, she learned to let kids be kids.

Messes can be cleaned.

Mulch bags can be put back to where they were.

Childhood memories…. those are things that can’t be replaced.

Happy Full Moon!


-SP

Bless Virgos and their love of fixing broken things.

I rambled and vented and went through a box of tissues and digressed and then vented some more until the sun came up and my eyes were too puffy with tears to remain open anymore.

I crashed in the early morning sun — the wind causing the suns rays to make hallucinations behind my eyelids, dancing me to REM.

As the clock strikes 3:33, 4:44 or 5:55AM every night, I often think about how being the good girl, doing everything right, interestingly enough made me the bad girl.

I shake my past around my mind until a tsunami forms from the quake, and floods into thoughts of the future and how either way, I’m doomed to drown.

I think about the past 15 years and how none of it turned out how I thought it would.

Both for better, and for worse.

I often think about the psychic I met in the back of a stuffy crystal shop in North Carolina, sipping her oversized gas station soda cup telling me with such certainty that I would in fact have children one day — 2 boys and 1 girl, who, surprisingly loves to go fishing. “Quite the tomboy, outdoors girl” she would repeat a few times in the conversation, tossing her head left to right, eyes closed.

”But not anytime soon” she told my 25 year old, oily skin.
I tilted my head, encouraging her to give more information.
”Not anytime soon… at all. This is much later in your life” she said with her eyes closed, now squeezing them together as if she’s right on the answer to a long math problem.

“muuuuuch later. Like way later in life.”

I left, thinking this would all happen at 30. Because 30 year olds are, like, super old people right?

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It’s interesting how your actions speak another language, that the brain ignores or can’t process.

Sometimes your ego will make you believe:

”I’m not like that.”

”That’s not me!”

But then your actions show, in fact, you are like that. That is who you are.

And so often we get hung up on making the right decision.

Should I leave this relationship, or stay and make it work?
Should I quit my job now, or be responsible and hold off a little longer?
I really want that experience. Should I spend the money now, or go next year & save up more?

On and on it goes…

…But, the answer always lies within you, you know.



How many times have you asked God, Spirit, for a sign and received the message to both stay and to go.

What the fuck, synchronicities.

I’ve followed synchronicities that led me to the most incredible experiences of my life.
I’ve also followed synchronicities that led me down some pretty dark roads to the toes of pretty dark people.

Why would Spirit lead me this way?

I think as I evolve in my spirituality, I fully realize that I am spirit.

It’s always been me!

I’ve found peace in the belief that there is no right or wrong decision…. there’s only a decision you make right.

Even without an ounce of Libra in my Birth Chart, I’ve struggled hard with decision making. I’m still working on re-establishing trust with myself to not make one of those decisions that end up with being toe to toe with trauma himself.

But then there’s gut feelings, downloads if you will, that come out of nowhere, without asking for them.

It hits me in the middle of the day as I take my pug on his routine walk.

It pops into my brain as I squeeze shampoo into the palm my hand.

I can’t stop thinking about it, as it takes 20 minutes to brush through my long, tangled hair.

I want to cut it off.

All of it.

Off.

When, not even a year ago, I let it drape down my back like a royal cape.
A lush symbol of beauty, fertility.

Proud of my genetics that let me grow such a thick head of pin straight, blonde hair. Daily compliments from strangers are as normal as the breeze.

But all of the sudden, and usually when I’m about to embark on a massive up-leveling in my life, I want to cut it all off.

I mean full on shave my head. One day I’ll probably do that. Why the hell not.

I crave freedom from the weight of the hair. Freedom from the 20 minutes it takes to brush it. I want to see myself with a different look — as having really long, straight hair becomes quite a part of your identity.

”Yeah! The girl with the long hair. Thats hers, yeah.”

I donated 12 inches of my hair the day after I got married.
Then I donated another 12 inches the Summer I got divorced.
I donated 10 inches when I fell in love with Mr.Virgo and left behind the Keys to call Texas home.

And now, as we just purchased our first plot of land…

I cut off and donated a record breaking 14 inches of my long, golden locks.

I can tell myself — everything’s fine! Nothing to see here. Yeah I cut off all my hair, it wasn’t a big deal. Status quo.

But clearly, the seed of intention planted in my mind months ago, to release my hair, and all the stories it holds…means something.

According to Professor Google:

”In many cultures and spiritual practices, cutting hair is considered a symbolic act of release and renewal, representing the shedding of past experiences and emotional burdens, allowing individuals to move forward with a fresh sense of self, making it potentially a spiritual act for some people”

Tracks.

When I cut my hair off after my wedding, it was an act of rebellion. I felt so out of control with everything that was happening so fast, I wanted to feel in control of something. I felt anger in that chair, just as I was angry walking into the social security office to change my last name to his.

When I cut my hair off after the divorce, it was an act of release. Pure, sad, emotional release. I did it. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, get a divorce… but I did it. I cried in that chair.

When I cut my hair moving from the Islands to Texas, I did it around the Spring Equinox. It felt playful, curious. An interest in what I would look like with short hair. Curious to know what a life going from flip flops to cowboy boots would feel like. I felt inventive in that chair.

Last week, as a Scorpio woman braided my hair into 4 sections to get ready for the execution, I felt excited. Really happy. I was counting down the days to this appointment.

”You know, I watch most women walk from their cars into the salon with their head down, shoulders hunched, looking somber as they come in. Then they get fixed up in here, and walk out with their head held high, all smiles.

…You might be the first person I’ve ever seen skip through those doors with your head high, a wide grin, ready to cut off over half of your hair.”

We joked and laughed, gossiped as women do about our shared struggles and triumphs in life, as my hair hit the floor. When she brought the braids around to let me say my final goodbyes, all I could think about was the little boy or girl who was going to get a wig made up of my hair.

They will wear the hair that blew through the wind on a seaplane in the Florida Keys.
They will brush hair that a rough man from Texas often braided in the Summer evenings — a silent act of bonding.
Their shoulders will be draped in hair that was pampered in a hair mask, sitting in my mama’s gardens on a Summer evening laughing with the neighbors under the stars.

I feel abundant right now. And the first thing that comes to mind when I win the lotteries of life, like good health & financial wealth, is to share it.

We sealed the envelope to ship out the braids to Locks of Love.

I stood up in my big platform boots feeling 30lbs lighter. I could not stop swaying my shoulders to nonexistent music, whipping my new, short, hair do around. It made everyone giggle. I felt like a child again — free from the heaviness and burdens adulthood brings.

My new hair takes 2 minutes to brush out of the shower. In the extra 18 minutes I now freed up, I hope to be planting a meadow of wildflowers on our property, where soon I will sit, with a hair mask on, letting the hummingbirds catch me up on the latest gossip.

And sometime soon, for someone out there, this will be the hair made into a wig…

yet again.

I’m starting to realize that dreams are best served cold.

Meaning, plant a simple seed of “ooh. That would be nice. I think I might like that one day.”

And let it go cold.

Focus on other things. Like being present with loved ones. Tending to your physical shell, your body. Learn new ways of being better to yourself and other humans. I mean really put it in the back of the fridge with the baking soda box you haven’t touched since last Summer. Let it marinate with the condiments.

Let it go cold.

Cold, after all, is a great way to preserve things and keep them alive! Like all the egg freezing pamphlets I’m offered as a childless 36 year old woman.

The other Monday was just another weekday.

Until Mr.Virgo & I started celebrating the best day we’ve experienced so far together as a team. Perhaps one of the best days of my life….

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I want to be in control of what influences my character. What develops me.

I cannot imagine if I went on a daily walk through the woods, and someone I dont know, from somewhere I’ve never heard of, presses a button and a hologram is revealed just beyond the pines, of a girl with fake body parts telling me how to eat holistically.

I take another few steps and hear a voice from the tree tops call me privileged for walking over pine needles and not the fallen oak leaves.

I run out of the woods and there’s a random person that I have to stare at 4 seconds too long to determine if they’re AI generated or not, showing me how perfect and clean and structured and happy their life is. I look down at my muddy, old shoes that I’m walking alone in, and feel the influence of low self esteem I had no idea was hiding under my hood.

I would go absolutely insane.

Yet, here I was scooping down spoonfuls of insanity in my own mouth every day. Post, Scroll, Repeat. It’s insane what the ruthless pursuit of working for yourself will do, and while I’m proud I utilized technology to create my social media following I’m not proud that I was on the wrong side of history and contributed to the social media cigarettes.

I changed my name today.

Lightworkers Lounge was founded in 2018 during my Saturn Return, and in the quiet of 2024 turning into 2025, under a Capricorn New Moon, I let her go and welcomed in someone new.

The Astrology Lounge.

I let go of Lightworkers because I just stopped talking about it; The spiritual world became saturated with cultural appropriation and broken people trying to heal others before themselves, creating more chaos in people than they came to them with. I couldn’t stand being associated with it. I’ve had people confess they passed over the podcast because they were so fed up with words like Lightworker.

I took no offense at all, because I was too.

The Astrology Lounge is the same Lounge, but solidifying the show to be solely about Astrology. Gone are the days we talk about Twin Flames. Gone are the days we talk masculine, feminine energy and childhood wounds. No longer do I feel I have the energy or even the right to talk about romantic relationships. Those are so nuanced, unique to the individuals involved, there is just no way one size fits all.

I wish I could hand you a magic pill to fix relationship problems, but there is just no way. Only you know what is best for you. Only you know how much you can handle, can live with.

Astrology is a Science. Take one look at an Ephemeris and you’ll see what I mean. It feels factual yet woo woo enough to trust in the unseen. I like to joke I’m a Ceteorologist — a meteorologist of the cosmos.

January 4th will mark 1 year since I’ve posted anything to my Instagram accounts. This used to really bother me. Now, it feels like a celebratory experience.

I think I’m finally free.

I came across the phrase “unwoke” the other day, and I liked it.

It felt like trying on a pair of jeans that surprisingly feel like sweats.

But it’s not that I don’t like my old pair of jeans.

They’ve just served their purpose; they kept me warm, protected, and moving forward. Being “woke” served it’s purpose in my life.

I cured an autoimmunity with no medical intervention.
I gained the courage to look in the mirror and do a lot of inner work to create a life I enjoy.
I trusted in something my senses can’t see to leave a very normal, safe corporate job and do something my soul always whispered about.

Being woke was fun.

But now, I just want to be normal. I want to eat a culver’s cheeseburger in the middle of Indiana and I dont want to ask Tarot Cards answers I already know but am too afraid to face.

I don’t want to scroll through endless advice, horoscopes, how-to, diet tips, fitness goals, I just want to see what someone in Minnesota is doing on their lunch break.

I outgrew those woke jeans, but they outgrew sitting on planes, trains, roaming through deserts and collecting mud on a mountain trail. They probably still have white sand weaved into the threads from the many jaunts by the sea.

I might keep them though, to throw on when I one day paint a room in a house we build.

I’ll always stay woke, though, because when you wake up you can never go back to sleep. If you know you know.

How I wish there was a melatonin for being “woke” in todays world.

They’re tried and true jeans - will always have a time & place to be used. Even when my aging, ever morphing body may not fit into them anymore, I might hold on to them for a sentimental purpose. A reminder of what was, as a portal to what could be. What can get better with time.

I went to my beloved happy place, Key West, for my birthday this year. The man of my dreams plotted & planned the entire trip, and it felt… different.

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It was the hottest week of the Summer.
Mid July.

Staying with my mom at her old, Amish built farmhouse in the tiny Midwest town I was born in, I rode my bike across the train tracks to the local gas station to buy a couple of bags of ice.

I gently leaned my kickstand-less bike against the side of the convenience store. I made space in my bike basket for the incoming bags of frozen liquid.

As I approached the front door, a woman that appeared to be in her 60s was walking towards the same door from the pumps.

”Wow! I wish I had your bravery!”

She exclaimed over in my direction.

I cocked my head to the side in confusion, signaling I needed more information to understand. A maneuver my pug taught me.

”If I went out without a bra, these things would catch the eye of everyone —” she motioned towards the very large, sagging breasts on her chest.

She smiled, with a twinkle of pride in her eyes, and held the door open for me.

Out of character for me, I did not know what to say. I said nothing at all.

I picked up what she was putting down though and without thinking about it, crossed my arms around my chest as if July flipped into December.

Great. Now I have to go in the freezer section and activate my breasts.

It’s a small town in Southern Indiana.
I will rarely see these people, as I live in Texas.
I don’t care.
Whatever.

I awkwardly kept my upper arms close to my chest to prevent the things on my chest from being seen again.

Are men looking?
Is the teenager counting my quarters looking?
Have I committed a small town crime?
Am I enticing young men, messing with their hormones?
Do these conservative people think I’m a hippy, sent here by satan himself to practice witchcraft and disclose the illegitimacy of Jesus?

All I wanted was a bag of ice.
I did not think that required a bra to achieve.

I pondered it on my bike ride home under the tall, old Oaks that I used to climb when I was young. Before I had breasts that needed cupped behind a shirt to not reap the attention and judgment of others. I miss her.

I thought about the last time I even wore a bra.

I paused on my bike and realized: it had been years. The only bra I own is old, torn with a yellow underwire hanging out in the right cup, collecting tiny lint balls on the straps…

It lies dormant in my dresser, awaiting the occasion where I deem it necessary to hide a part of my body to be socially accepted.

I’m a feminist, I guess. Have I taken it too far?

If my breasts get groped with consent, if I get unwanted whistles and shouts from men, did I ask for it?
Would it be playing the victim if a man followed me home to see where I live so he could prowl like a lion waiting to get a taste of my breasts, and I called my boyfriend or police to ask for help?

My body has yet to bear children. Perhaps if it ever does, I will find a logical use for a bra to protect my sensitive, life giving breasts. To give the sag of heavy skin a lift. But until then — should I have to wear a bra?

When you Google “Why were bras invented?” you get the answer:

— it can be uncomfortable to do jumping jacks or ride a horse without a bra.

Huh. I see that. I do wear sports bras when I workout. But they’re cotton. Stretchy. Soft. No wires, no pushup. My nipples still show.

The other reasons bras were invented, according to Google, are expressing sexuality, fashion statements, and overall lift and support for women with large breasts.

Am I making a fashion statement by going bra-less? Cool. Kinda like that.
Am I expressing my sexuality by walking around other people with uninhibited nipples? Oh geez. That is totally not my intention by not wearing a bra. Great.

As mentioned in this article, I do understand how painful large breasts can be and how good it can feel to have a soft, supportive strap holding them close to the chest. I’m not anti bra here.

I suppose that woman’s comment affected me to the level of writing about it a year later because I inspired her to be free. And I love that.

But I had no idea a bike ride to the gas station would be such an act of rebellion. I’ll take it though.

I still don’t wear a bra. I still don’t even think twice about putting one on in the morning. I also don’t think twice about when I walk into a public space: Are people looking at my boobs?

I just walk in, comfortable enough in my skin and my clothes to acknowledge and say hello to people with a big smile, and carry on with my day.

I don’t like bras. I don’t like super tight articles of clothing that leave red indents on my skin. I don’t want to make myself uncomfortable to be socially accepted anymore.

Hell, I gave up bras years ago and most recently, I gave up jeans. Screw tight jean leggings or stiff waist bands. Yuck. Give me soft, free flowing material. Give me gentle, movable, ethically made and natural.

And I think that’s the deeper meaning behind all of this. By doing things that feel right and good to me, no matter what anyone else thinks about it, I’m helping us move in a different direction.

And I didn’t even know it. Didn’t even try.

I Asked the Morning at sunrise, topless, what she thinks of my radical ideology around breasts.

She laughed.

- SP

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I went on the birth control pill when I became sexually active at age 18. I ballooned. My breasts were so large, so full, I couldn’t see my toes. My hips widened even more. Sleeves on shirts felt like a blood pressure cuff.

At a towering 5’2, this was not how heavy I wanted to feel in my little body.

I remember walking to the University dining commons up to 5 times a day. For meals. For snacks. I was always so hungry. While everyone was at class, I was sneaking a second sandwich right after lunch was over and eating it in the hallway behind a plant.

Strategically, so no one could see me and say hey, didn’t you just eat?

I started to cry. Tears saturated the meat, cheese and bread. I wasn’t hungry for food. I was hungry for stability. For confidence. For bravery.

These hormones were making me insane.

I never weighed myself back then, but I can imagine it was way too much.

I threw the rest of that sandwich away.
I walked the empty halls to the deans office to withdraw from school.
I waited for him outside of his physical education class and broke up with that boy.
I left that college I never wanted to attend anyway.

As soon as I got home, as soon as I threw those birth control pills away, I felt myself come back. I was getting my colors back. My wings.

I started cutting calories and running on the treadmill every single day. No days off. Apples and rice cakes replaced 2 stacked ham sandwiches for a lunch.

By the end of that Spring Semester, I had a body that was more in shape than it was before.

I got down to 117lbs. It became an obsession, watching the number on the scale. I would weigh myself multiple times a day.

I started to think I looked a bit too skinny, and noticed my body absolutely refused to lose more weight. I veered on the edge of starving myself just to see if I could reach 115, but my body held on tight to all 117lbs.

I settled with it, and gently allowed myself to eat a bit more and exercise a bit less. I felt good. Really good. I looked even better.

Then I went to school in Las Vegas and turned 20. Which is basically legal drinking age on the Las Vegas strip.

Having no idea how many calories are in alcoholic beverages, and not realizing that in’n’out and del taco at 2AM after a party will not keep you slim for long, I stumbled into the nurses office one day because I felt absolute exhaustion and feverish fatigue.

”Aw, I’m sorry you feel so awful. Let’s get your weight and vitals real quick”

Said the nurse

With half closed eyes, I stepped on the scale.

143lbs.

With now wide open eyes, I almost vomited all over her sneakers.

I looked at her like a kid looking at their mom for safety after seeing a ghost.

DO SOMETHING? CHANGE THIS NUMBER? DO YOU SEE THIS? OH MY GOD. I’M OBESE!!! WHY ARENT YOU SHOCKED?

143lbs. I had gained almost 30lbs since my rice cake and apple days earlier that year. I knew my button down shirts were popping.

Keep in mind, I’m 5’2.

I moved home shortly after the nurses visit from hell due to the 2008 financial crisis. I knew what I had to do. Rice Cakes. Apples. Workout.

But one thing that changed was my PTSD from the scale. I was always told never get over 130, or else you’re in deep water of an obese BMI.

I never looked at it again.

A few years later, I got engaged.
Two years later, Married.
Moved away from home.
Found out I had Hashimotos Thyroid Autoimmunity at age 25.
Cut out wheat, dairy, and sugar from my diet.
Went on daily 2 hour walks through the woods for stress management.
Healed every health ailment I had.

Bonus: I got so slim.

But — I never looked at the scale. I don’t even think we owned one. I would look down the hall when the doctor would weigh me. Didn’t wanna know. Write it down and write me off. Not looking!

This leads us to now. Age 35.

Around 32 I started to notice exercise wasn’t as easy.
At age 33 I started to educate myself on my menstrual cycle and why 2 weeks out of the month I feel like I’m wearing a lead suit and clothes don’t fit.
At 34, I noticed quite the muffin top in my workout shorts, and again, my boobs are getting big. My arms wiggle when I wave to someone. I see myself on camera and think WHOA. Do other people see me as that big?

I stopped taking photos of myself.
I started wearing baggier clothes.
My partner would ask to see how much I weigh and I would say nope. No. Absolutely not.

When I had surgery in October ‘22, I think I caught a glimpse of my weight being 140 something…

But the other morning, after a really rough night, I finally decided to step into my power and heal the trauma from the college scale.

I stepped on one.

I knew I would be heavy. I fully expected 143. I was ready for impact.

But when I took a deep breath, then looked down, I was shocked at what was looking back up at me.

154.6



Shock.
Acceptance.
Fear.
Calm.
No way.
But of course.
All poured through me at once.

I thought that was what I would weigh when I was pregnant.

I can finally see the truth, and I can finally see that yeah, I need to do something about this.

I cried. Letting out the fear of a number. Releasing the pain I felt as a stout little girl being raised around toothpick little boys.
I cried for the teenager in high school who got “FAT ASS!” yelled at her in the hallway. Because yeah, I’ve got some glutes.

I cried for the emotions in me, that grieve and grieve over motherhood never choosing me. I think my body really gained weight over that. Like a lone wolf, packing in the nutrients and foods waiting for a baby to come but it never does. So you just gain and gain and gain…..

154.6lbs. I was once so terrified to see that myself, now I’m sharing it on a public forum. I guess this is growing up.

And I know — trust me, I know — “Thats nothing! Muscle weighs more than fat! You’re aging!”

I get it. And those are all correct. But to me, it represents much more.

I used to coach clients on how to lose weight. How did I become the client?

The same way they did.

Stress. Emotional protection. Life has been so chaotic since the pandemic, since my divorce before that, I found solace in food. Overeating to feel heavy, to ground myself. Not working out because I’m so emotionally fatigued that it spreads to my physical.

I’m also so attached to my dog, once he started to slow down I started to stay home with him.

135 is now my goal weight. Hell, I’ll even be happy seeing 140.

I’ve been cutting my caloric intake nearly in half and doing an hour of cardio a day. It feels really good to get back in a routine that makes me feel good, mentally especially.

I look at my lineage of beautiful, strong German and Swedish women. The curvy Yugoslavian great grandmother who ate straight from the garden in Iowa.

It’s in my DNA to look strong. To look sturdy. And I love that. Every massage therapist or OBGYN I see always asks me: “Are you an athlete!? Your shoulders and legs are so strong!”

I accept my weight. I’m not stepping on a scale anymore unless I need to. I’m going by how my clothes fit, and if I feel strong enough to hike, bike, and do all the outdoor things I love.

I’m also accepting the aging process.
Accepting that I cannot eat the same way I used to when I was young.
Accepting that it takes even more tenacity and patience to lose weight, than when I was young.
Accepting that it’s a very natural process to soften as you age…

I grieve for the 16 year old that was always asked why she never ate lunch. Because I had so much anxiety being stalked by bullies.
I grieve for the 20 year old who stumbled into the nurses office 30lbs heavier in 6 months. Because she was so afraid of not fulfilling her dreams, and she was going to college when deep down she never wanted to.
I grieve for the 18 year old crying, eating her second sandwich. Because she was letting everyone define her identity, and desperate for love from a man.
I grieve for the 35 year old. As I pack my bags to step into my 36th trip around the sun next month, I thank her for never giving up on being a mother. For spending these years nurturing all sorts of people who may not be her children, but needed love. I pat her shoulders and remind her of how strong she is.

The Morning reminds me that none of us are in control of our fate, we just move where it feels good, safe, and right.

For only then, will the weight of the world shed off.

With love,
SP

Advice is good.

Story telling is paramount.

But what about the things you just don’t have an answer to?

The things you scour the internet for.
Spend your last dollar asking a prophet for.
The thing you seek in God.

Like… why you pour everything into something and nothing comes of it.

Or why you are denied by God, Universe, Source, Spirit, the very thing you feel in your bones you know should be yours.

Things Astrology can’t explain.
A Tarot Reading misses.
God doesn’t listen to.

I don’t know why people suffer, and others flourish.
I don’t know why some people hurt animals.
Why some people abuse children.
How some people can let love sit still for so long it drains through the cracks.

How in a world of billions of people, someone is dying alone right now.

The more I learn, the less I seem to know.

The more I Research, Google, Archive, and take in “self help”
the less I seem to help myself.

I don’t know why that one got away.
Or why the one you know is the one for you, didn’t stay.

I can’t tell you why some things that have happened to you are so unfair.
(For what it’s worth, I don’t know you, but I do care.)

I have no advice for why someone would do that to you.
Or why you could find yourself doing something like that to them.
Or why it’s taking you well into your 40’s to learn a lesson and break a pattern.

But what I do know is you’re human, and there’s a weird thing in us that makes us do weird things on a whim.

So whatever. I don’t know.

Eat this
Drink that
Don’t get too thin
God forbid you get fat.

What’s right and what’s wrong?
Have we always known all along?
Can we only find our truth in the lyrics of someone else’s song?

These are the things I don’t know.

How to rebuild trust when it’s been broken for so long.
How to forgive when there’s a scar as a reminder everyday…

How to move through the world with happiness when someone who wasn’t supposed to die, isn’t here anymore.

How to experience joy when the set and setting and people in the story are all wrong.
How to figure out how you got to that point.
How your story, your reality, turned into something your truth never intended it to be.
I don’t know.

These are the things, I’m so sorry, but I don’t know.

I don’t know why people cheat.
I don’t know why people lie.
I don’t know why some people never start the dream in their heart.
And my god, I wish I knew how to force some people who are insanely talented to let their gift shine!!!!

I wish I knew.

I wish I could fly around the world as a little fairy with a wand and tap my fairy dust onto the heads of everyone who needs healing.

*Bippity-Boppity-now you know what to do.*

Because if everyone is happy, certain of their path, compassionate, safe… the world would be perfect…. right?

If everyone had a clear definition as to why everything happened to them, surely we could all live in a state of ever flowing Peace…

Right?

And we can stop focusing so much on how to figure out the vast spectrum of emotions, and healing, and the psychology of it all.

Our only problem to solve would be what pie to bake for our friends and family who love and accept us every single day and never betray or lie or hurt our feelings or get sick or suddenly die and leave us or have opinions that trigger us:

Peach or Cherry, darling?

Wait. I might put myself out of a job then.

I don’t know.

I don’t know when you will heal.
I don’t know if you ever will.

I don’t know if you should apologize.
I don’t know if you’ll ever get one from them.

Will therapy and coaching and readings and religion help you break the pattern?
I hope so. But honestly, I don’t know.

I don’t know how to create, foster, and maintain a healthy relationship.
I don’t know if that’s even a feasible goal for the human species.

I don’t know how to raise a child.
I don’t even know how to have one.

I don’t know what it’s like to lose a parent.
But I grew up missing 1 of the 2.

I have no clue what it’s like to have a father.
No clue what it’s like to deal with his emotions, his discipline, his past wounding being pressed down on me… his love.

I have no idea.
”Fah-Thur.” It has such a weird ring to it coming out of my mouth.

I don’t know how to manifest abundance, money, and love.
And I don’t know how I did it, but I got all of it.

I just got tired of responding to someone’s question of,
“Why don’t you just go after what you want?”
with:
I don’t know.

There’s a lot of people on the internet telling you that they do know.
Telling you that they know how.
They know what to do!
Listen to them!

But what they don’t know, is you.

It’s ok to keep going in life and not know what the hell you’re doing.

I woke up early this morning to try and figure out what to write about this week.
I have a tendency to veer towards writing about how to heal, how to see things differently, how to get healthy, spewing advice without taking it myself.

My other idea for a post was forcing myself to do something I hate,
I would write something that started off with:

”Once Upon a Time…”

And it scared me.

Why?

Dude. I don’t know.

I needed to be cradled in the stillness of a purple sky just before sunrise to help me solve a problem.

Despite being late October, the morning temperature that greeted me upon sliding open the doors to the East facing porch was record high. Hot.

Puffy cumulonimbus clouds rolling by in a fast, balmy breeze greeted my Puffy morning face.

I took a deep inhale of the humid air and Asked The Morning what they think:

”I don’t know.”

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