Linda Goodman's Sun Signs (13 page)

It's a good idea to give a Taurus child music or singing lessons as soon as possible. Almost every one of them will have a low, soft, melodious voice, and many of them have considerable vocal or musical talent, and you'll want to discover it while he's young enough to be trained in the right direction. Even if he's not going to make music his career, he'll enjoy listening to it on his own little record player in his room. He may prefer the classics to modern sounds or nursery rhymes. He'll probably like to draw, color or paint, and the chances are good that he may have some real artistic ability. Be sure your Taurus has lots of paper and colored pencils. It's his favorite way of expressing himself.

Teachers usually find the Taurus child a credit to the class. Unless there are afflicting planet positions in the nativity, Taurean boys and girls will be industrious in school, learn their lessons methodically and have excellent powers of concentration. They're not whiz kids like the Gemini and Aquarian or Aries students, but they probably won't be tardy or throw spit balls in study hall, though they may break up if Teacher gets her finger caught in the pencil sharpener. The Taurus youngster is ordinarily quite obedient. His mind absorbs slowly, but he never forgets what he's learned, once a fact or date is mastered. These boys and girls usually do well on tests, because they prepare for them carefully. They're often chosen leaders of group activities, due to their love of fair play—and also due to their obvious common sense and good judgment.

The Taurus child may give his elders a few bad moments because of his stubbornness, but they'll be few and far between. One mother of a young Taurean I know took her son to school one day and was sorry she didn't stay home and keep out of it. The little bull had insulted his teacher by insisting her facts were wrong. So was the author of the textbook, naturally. The next day, his mother marched him to the teacher's desk with the firm command, “Apologize to Miss Applegarden, Sammy.” That was about nine o'clock in the morning. At noon, in the principal's office, the mother was heard wearily repeating the order, “Apologize to Miss Applegarden, Sammy.” Later in the day, after the students had been dismissed, the janitor was gathering up trash baskets. As he passed the office, he heard a strange, faraway, trembling voice, almost ghost-like, floating from the inner sanctum. “Apologize to Miss Applegarden, Sammy,” it said. “For the last time, apologize.” Through the closed door came the hollow sound of a wooden paddle being applied. Then silence. The next day, the little boy was back at his desk. He had outlasted the teacher, his mother and the principal. He never did apologize. But he made the honor roll.

Once you're resigned to the knowledge that nothing this side of a derrick will move your Taurus youngster when he digs his sturdy toes in the earth, you'll enjoy watching him grow up. He'll probably get tons of dirt on his clothes playing with his toy trucks and tractors—and the hair of little Taurean boys has the oddest way of smelling like a warm bird's nest, no matter how often you wash it—but he won't lose his report card or his marbles. He won't drive Dad's car too fast and end up wrapping it around a telephone pole when he's older. He may raid the refrigerator, and eat the fried chicken you were saving for dinner, or be tough on the new furniture. But he'll be mighty easy on your heart when he gets big. And he won't forget your birthday. Your little Taurus girl may tear her party dress climbing into her tree house, or go into a rage when someone breaks one of her precious possessions. But she'll help you bake cookies, and you'll always be welcome in her lovely home after she's happily settled down with her own family. Your grandchildren will probably be well-behaved, in either case.

Raise your little bull or heifer in a cozy, snug atmosphere of love. Surround him with visible affection instead of invisible barbed wire fences. Don't pull on his horns too hard, and let him graze at his own calm tempo. Fill his ears with music and his eyes with beauty, and he'll fill your heart with peace someday. Even Miss Applegarden will forgive him.

You say you have one of those sweet Taurus bosses who never nags or fusses, and you don't need any advice or tips on how to handle that complacent, dear, docile creature? You have her just where you want her—in the palm of your hand? Well, you're certainly learning your Sun signs just in time to avoid a disaster. Before it's too late, you'd better memorize the one major rule for dealing with a Taurean executive:
Don't try her patience too far.

It's a tougher rule than it seems. If she's a typical Taurus, she has such enormous patience, it's downright tempting to try it. Her manner is so peaceful and her disposition so steady, you're apt to think of her as “good old Ms. Bearumple.” Then you'll start treating her like a nice, shaggy bear, who's a little stubborn perhaps, but kindly and perfectly harmless. You'll remember the happy ending to the Goldilocks story, and let your guard down. That's just what you should not do. It could be the beginning of the end.

Yes, I know that Goldilocks got away with eating Papa Bear's porridge, sitting in his big chair, and napping on his bed. But bears are not bulls. Don't confuse your animals. Just because they get them mixed up in the stock market doesn't mean you should get them mixed up in the office. Bears live in the woods, and sometimes go after honey. Bulls live on the farm, and sometimes go after pushy people. Bears can squeeze strangers hard in a spirit of fun, but they mean no harm. They're playful. Bulls can destroy trespassers and china shops in blind fury, on purpose. They're dangerous. End of zoology lesson.

Today, you're safe. But who knows what tomorrow may bring? It may bring you sudden regret that you tried the patience of your Taurus boss too far. You may wish you hadn't imposed on her good nature with such casual confidence. It's not hard to see how you got on the wrong path. It happens all the time to people who work for Taurean executives. She's so meek and understanding when you turn in a letter that's sloppily typed, you may not bother to check your spelling too often afterwards. She's so considerate when you mess up the figures on your semiannual report, you may be a little careless with your math on other papers. Since she doesn't yell and glare at you when you take an extra half hour at lunch, you may try for an extra hour the next week, and gradually stretch it to two hours. It's so easy to slide into a fool's paradise. Have you allowed yourself to drift into these lazy habits under the spell of your boss's easy-going personality and quiet manner? You'd better hang one of those “Danger—Ferocious Bull” signs (the kind you see out in the country) over your desk. It might save your life very soon, or at least your job, and sometimes one is pretty synonymous with the other. You can't very well say to your landlord, “I'm sorry I'm three months behind on my rent, but I haven't found a new job yet. I got fired from my last one with no notice, because, you see, I had this boss who was born in May—and I didn't understand about the Taurean temper because of the Venus rulership. It was that darned Venus that fooled me.” If you find a landlord who won't give you an immediate eviction notice after that explanation, you must live in the land of Oz.

It's much easier to practice your Sun sign knowledge in the beginning. The reason your boss was so nice and unruffled when you typed that letter, made those mistakes in the report and lingered so long over your lunch hour, was not because she's a nice, shaggy bear pushover. Nor was it because she's too shy and timid to express his wishes or exert his authority. Frankly, she didn't see any point in embarrassing you by making a big fuss over one or two or even a few goofs. She figured you had enough common sense (remember that phrase) not to repeat yourself like a broken record. She decided to watch you patiently to see if you were practical enough to profit by past errors on your own. Aye! There's the rub! Her patience was carefully calculated toward a definite purpose—to test you, and to give you a chance to prove your mettle. She admires people who learn the knack of disciplining themselves. She's a self-made woman. Why shouldn't you be? She's willing to give you the opportunity.

She is determined to give everyone a fair break. She won't judge hastily. She won't expect miracles overnight, nor will she mind if you're a little slow in catching on to her methods and her very set procedures. You'll be given a chance to find your way around, and she'll look the other way more than once if you stumble in the dark. But make no innocent, naive mistakes about her ultimate goal. She wants things done his way. Her way could conceivably be the way things were done when the Smith Brothers got together and decided to cure coughs, but to her, it's the tried and true, proven method. Besides those fellows still cure
her
coughs! As long as her methods keep making money, she's going to be loyal to them. She's willing to waste plenty of her huge supply of patience to find employees who fit her cement mold. However, once you've pressed her patience too far, she will first balk, then snort in anger, and finally shout, “You're fired!”—possibly at the top of her lungs. (At least it will seem loud, because it will be so emphatic.) Your only warning will probably will be that she failed to answer your cheerful, unsuspecting, “Good morning,” the previous day. Know beyond any doubt that she's not going to change her mind after she's decided to sack you. Nothing changes the Taurus mind, once it's made up. She may give you a generous slice of severance pay, because she doesn't want that cold-hearted landlord to throw you and your sick grandmother and the twelve children out in the snow. But she won't give you any more chances once she's firmly convinced herself that you're dead weight to the company she cherishes only a shade less than she does her husband. It's not that she is unkind. Your memory is short if you think that. Hers is not. Recall, as you search the internet for a new job, how kind she was for all those months when you were so carefully taking advantage of her faith in you.

The Taurean boss is a thoroughly practical soul. Although she needs to feel that her business allows her to express the beauty in his nature creatively, She needs even more to succeed materially. Taurus men are never satisfied to run a small business. They want to build it into a possible empire. The Taurus boss won't be content without some expansion, however minor. There will be no dramatic, sweeping changes, and progress will proceed one step at a time. She'll build gradually, without flash or fanfare, but she'll build. She sticks to anything she starts and finishes what she begins, and she'll expect you to do the same thing.

Don't try too many short cuts. She wants her facts plain, not fancy. Taurus bosses have no more patience with the art of gilding the lily than Capricorn executives. One of her favorite phrases will be, “Get to the point,” but she'll say it without rancor or sarcasm. Lengthy preliminaries in explaining ideas make her nervous, though she'll retain his outward immobility.

It will be frustrating when she refuses to budge an inch for your most exciting concepts, and when she won't let you try out that new system you read about in
Fortune
(or picked up from your brother-in-law, who's such a cracker jack promoter). Granted, sometimes she's wrong for refusing to listen to progressive ideas, and you'll feel smug when another company tries them first successfully. But over the long haul, when the final score is tallied, she'll come out ahead. What if that new gadget she stubbornly rejected as “a harebrained abortion of some schizophrenic's daydream” runs into a snag, and the company that zoomed ahead by using it suddenly goes bankrupt when the gadget backfires? Then your smugness will be replaced by a foolish feeling, and finally by respect for this sometimes cranky, often obstinate, but kindly and understanding boss, who has such a practical head on her sturdy shoulders.

Taurus executives usually prefer peace to noisy arguments. They will always try quiet common sense discussions to avoid emotional scenes. Remember, common sense is the key phrase. But that doesn't mean they're lacking in imagination or appreciation of the finer things in life. You'll be pretty sure to make a large hit with your Taurean boss if you wear a hint of cologne and your wardrobe includes soft, cheery tones. She loves nice smells and soothing, pastel colors. You'll also please her if you occasionally bring her some home-made vichyssoise—but you'd better call it potato soup. Fancy names and titles don't impress her as much as they make her uneasy. That goes for the dress code as well. People who work for a Taurean shouldn't worry about dressing to impress. Taureans prefer simple attire and sensible shoes, and that you keep your feet on the ground, not on the desk.

You may chafe at his stubborn, bull-headed attitude at least once a week, but remember this about your Taurus boss: she's also stubborn about being loyal to people who never let her down. Be one of those people, and you'll never have to fear the dangerous bull. She's really quite gentle if the red flag of defiance isn't waved in her face too often. Grab some concrete blocks, and help her build her empire. She'll be glad to share it with you, if you deserve it. Promotion she understands. Feather-bedding she does not. “Good old Ms. Bearumple” will expect you to carry your own weight, but she'll always give you a lift when the load gets heavy. She's strong and dependable. She says what she means and she means what she says. You won't need an interpreter. If she says you're a blockhead, leave quickly and quietly and don't quibble. If she says “You'll do well enough,” you have real job security. That means you've passed her test of loyalty, sincerity, ability and potential. Move to the head of the class. You've made the honor roll. Congratulations! Don't let it swell your hat size, and you have a promising future ahead of you.