I read my horoscope regularly―it’s on the same page with the word puzzles―but I usually take it lightly. I am a Scorpio and I know that is a deep water sign, which suggests depth of all kinds, deep thoughts or deeply hidden emotions.  I’ve been accused of both.  Lately the horoscope page has been telling me that with the sun now coming into my sign I have lots of energy.

aster in sand, Ghost Ranch

Some days I do have lots of energy, but I prefer to attribute it to the weather.  I am like the purple aster which blooms best in the fall and continues until the frost.

One time my horoscope went way too far, promising that I can do it all. “You will with joy accomplish every item on today’s list.”

“This is a trap!” I declare to the newspaper page.  Yes I could do it all, but I would have to spend tomorrow, or maybe two tomorrows, recovering.  I’d be back where I started then, if not worse, since the to-do list would pile up while I returned to normal.

“This must be a message for another Scorpio,” I argue.  “One who’s more organized, more disciplined.”  I am actually quite disciplined about writing.  The horoscope writer doesn’t know where my focus has to be.  My to-do list is all the other, smaller things I ought to do, the ones I will forget if I don’t write them down.

It’s silly to be talking back to the newspaper horoscope.  An artist coach whose work I read somewhere suggested that one shouldn’t worry about one’s list, because half of it won’t matter in the long run.  Which half would that be?  The glasses that need adjusting?  The socks that are due for replacement?  Triage itself takes time and attention.  Meanwhile the list gets longer.  That coach is right on the principle, however.  A focus on to-do lists is a drain on creativity.

Would it be accurate to say that we all have more important things to do than the things on our lists?  It all depends, of course, on what we put on those lists.  I never put “write” on the list.  I just do it.  I don’t put “love” on a list either.  We don’t need lists for the really important things.

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