Linda Goodman's Sun Signs (69 page)

Like the March winds, your Pisces woman will have many a mood. She's terribly sentimental, and when her feelings are wounded, she can cry buckets. She'll look at you so reproachfully you'll feel as if you'd just shot a small rabbit. Pisces females sometimes get the idea they're hopelessly unequipped for the fierce battles and driving ambition required to survive. Then deep depression sets in. At these times, you'll have to tell her she's admired for her deep, mysterious wisdom and her blessed understanding by every single human she has ever graced with her friendship. It's usually the gospel truth. The hardest lesson she has to learn is to overcome her timidity and her doubts. If the fears go deep, she'll shut herself off from others, then wonder why she's lonely. She's often afraid of imposing, pushing too hard, taking advantage, when such thoughts are in no one's head but hers.

Now and then a Pisces will cover her shyness and vulnerability with wisecracks, a sophisticated veneer and a frigid independent personality, but it's merely a cloak of protection, worn to hide her uncertainty from the prying eyes of rough people, who would bruise her gentle heart if she exposed it. I know one who pours out her real soul by writing lovely song lyrics, with a secret message woven in the shades of her soft, very private dreams. When she's not writing, she's the picture of the brittle, callous, career woman she wants people to see. Yet, even this type of Pisces is unable to fight her Sun sign. With all her make-believe independence she waits on the curb and lets the man whistle for the cab. There are some things one just doesn't do, as far as Neptune women are concerned; not acting like a lady in public is one of them. She fools a lot of men who could quiet her inner fears and make her take back her frequent claim of, “Who needs a husband? They only mess up your life.” Imagine a statement like that from a Piscean, who needs to belong to someone more than she needs to sleep, eat or breathe.

A Pisces woman will give all of her heart to her children, except for the large chunk she saves for you. She'll love them all, but the ones who are uglier, weaker, smaller or sicker may have a slight edge with her. Only a Pisces movie star would pass up the little dimpled darlings and adopt a tiny, crippled tot with frightened eyes. Female fish are the greatest women in the world for understanding the shyness of small boys and the growing pains of awkward, adolescent girls. A Piscean mother spins a thousand wispy, cobweb dreams over each bassinet. She'll sacrifice anything so her children can have what she was denied as a child. She may be too permissive. Administering discipline is difficult for her, and she must realize that a lack of firmness is often as bad as severe neglect. In a way, it is neglect, of building the small characters in her care, who need firm guidance to learn to swim alone. If she's guilty of too much softness, explain it to her kindly. She'll comprehend without bitterness, and begin to give the hairbrush a workout. Still many Neptune mothers manage a happy medium between discipline and kindness, and their offspring do them credit.

A Pisces woman will gladly let you earn the bacon and eggplant. She'll probably prefer not to enter the brutal competition of the commercial world, unless you desperately need her to. She had enough of that (if she's a typical Neptune female) when she worked for that big, confusing company while she was waiting for you to rescue her. Some, not all, but some Pisces women are a wee, little bit extravagant. She may need some help figuring out why the bank's balance doesn't reconcile with her stubs, written in Sanskrit. Still, when an emergency forces her to adapt her champagne taste to a skim milk pocketbook, she'll manage.

She listens to the ocean, and it tells her things. In the midst of the city, she still hears the waves of Neptune, whispering to her Pisces heart more, perhaps, than she wants to know. Don't forget her birthday or your anniversary or the day you proposed. She won't. I'll always remember the Pisces friend I went to school with in West Virginia. She was tiny, with long, dark hair and those strange Neptune lights in her greenish brown eyes. She married (among several other men) a big football star; it was a totally unexpected elopement. I remember when she asked him why he proposed. She was curious. “Well,” he told her, “it was the funniest thing, Shorty. I didn't have the slightest idea of proposing that day. We were in the park, near the pool. The chicks who were lying around getting a tan had wet, stringy hair from swimming, and they looked all hot and sweaty on the benches. You were sitting there under that tree in a white lace dress, and you looked so cool and different from the others. You looked like—well, I guess you sorta looked like a girl.” That's the subtle secret of the Pisces woman. Whether she follows Neptune's call as a dedicated nun in a convent or as a sultry songstress in a noisy nightclub—she's feminine. Ultra feminine. One hundred percent.

Most babies, as everyone knows, were found under a cabbage leaf. A few are carried in that long diaper, hanging from the stork's bill or were brought to the hospital in the doctor's black bag. Not your little Pisces bundle. He came straight from fairyland, clutching a moonbeam. If you look closely, you'll still see the reflection of elves and magic wishing trees in his
dreamy
little eyes, maybe even a trace of
Stardust
smudged behind his left ear. His wings may have
disappeared
by the time he gets to the delivery room, but there's
probably
a small bump where they were once fastened.

You've seen those congratulation cards for new mothers, with pictures of dimpled, pink and white painted babies, fragile and gauzy, flying around over the verse. The artist used your Pisces babe as a model. This could make you think you can lead your Neptune child by the toe, or that after you've scrubbed that shiny stardust out of his ears, you can mold him into any shape you like. Why not, when he's such a gentle, delicate little lump of clay? Think again. He'll get his own way, just as surely as the yelling, red-faced Aries baby, the demanding, regal Leo baby or the stubborn, tough little Taurus baby. The only difference is that he'll get it by charming you to death, and drowning you in oceans of sweet smiles and winning ways.

As soon as the ink is dry on the birth certificate, turn in the name of your little Pisces boy for the lead in the first future production of
Peter Pan
or the girl for
Alice in Wonderland.
Peter Pan and Alice will be the Neptune children's favorite roles, and they won't need a stage to act the parts superbly. They'll still be starring in them when they're eighty. Parents who breathe the age-old prayer, “I wish baby never had to grow up,” will get their wish if baby was born under the sign of the fish. The years won't leave any lasting impression: there will always be a childish, dreamy, magical quality of make-believe hanging like a mist over the Pisces. It will drench him in mystery and unreality forever-and-three-days.

By the time he's old enough to crawl into the jam pot and hide, this strange child of yours will show a preference for living in a world of fancy. He'll enjoy diversions that are far removed from everyday patterns and routines. When he's in the high chair, he'll eat like an angel, if you pretend you're a queen or a clown while you're feeding him. Wear a lampshade, dripping with all your old, sparkling necklaces, or a mop for a wig; smear lipstick and chalk on your face. His imagination will supply the rest. When he's a little older, he'll play happily on the front porch while you do the washing, if you hang up a few balloons, put some music on, toss around his stuffed animals, give him some popcorn and tell him he's at the circus.

When he's old enough to start to school and begin to have those peculiar dreams at night, you'll be tying his shoes one ordinary spring morning and get a shock. “Guess who I saw last night?” he'll remark confidentially. You'll mumble a polite rejoinder—now where on earth is his green sweater? Oh, there it is—on the teddy bear he dressed up yesterday, when he was pretending it was his best friend.

“Who did you see?”

He'll answer casually, “Grandma Stratton. We talked for a long time, then she had to go. She said to tell you to be sure to water her geraniums and send Uncle Clarence the money.”

Since Grandmother Stratton died before he was born, this could unnerve you a little, on an empty stomach, before coffee. But it's nothing to the prickly sensation you'll get after breakfast, when he's in school and the mailman delivers a letter from your Uncle Clarence from whom you haven't heard in five years, asking for a loan to start a new business.

The wisest parents have difficulty arranging a schedule that will stick with a Pisces offspring. Schedules and routines are his natural enemies, and he'll do everything in his fertile imagination to avoid them. Babies who live upside down—sleep all day and stay awake all night—are often Neptune infants. He wants to eat when he's hungry, sleep when he's tired and play when something attracts his fancy, whenever that might be. Trying to get him to eat, sleep or play at any other time is quite a task. Actually, it's rather a sensible attitude, but the times he gets hungry, tired or playful may vary considerably from day to day and night to night. You might as well adjust your schedule to his. He'll seldom throw tantrums, scream or balk to get you to come around to his way, but he'll gradually win you over by evasive, elusive tactics, and confuse you into capitulation. You may even get charmed yourself, by the sheer freedom of it. Not feeling guilty when you chat with neighbors over coffee during the feeding hour, playing a fascinating game of “Princess and Frog” in the still magic hours of dawn—or sharing a bowl of vegetable soup and a cup of hot chocolate with him in the middle of a dreary, gray winter afternoon can become strangely attractive. He might even teach you there's no reason to let that silly clock be a cruel, infallible dictator over your life. It's only a ticking hunk of metal.

The Pisces child will require a healthy amount of attention and appreciation. He'll have to be noticed and encouraged, because he's uncertain about his abilities. Give him as many bushels of it as he needs. He'll also require his moments of privacy. When he goes into one of his mysterious moods of withdrawal, let him be. His mind is a million light years away, and you can't follow. He'll return in plenty of time for his vegetable soup and hot chocolate. Only by now, he'll have changed his lunch hour to mid-evening. If he tells you he was out flying on a saucer with a man from Mars, believe him. It just might be so.

Teachers are always confused when they try to put this odd-shaped peg into a round or square educational hole. He may not fit into either. You'll probably have heaps of struggles between his unique methods of learning and the school's stale routines. He'll simply refuse to conform to a pattern not his own. Don't blame him too much. The educational system has yet to catch up with Neptune's wisdom. Many Pisces boys and girls are artistic, and most of them love music and dancing. Typical Neptunian youngsters are light on their feet, regardless of their weight. The little girl often longs to be a ballerina; the little boy usually chooses heroes like Beethoven, Michelangelo, the astronauts or Saint Anthony over scientists, presidents and generals. They love all kinds of books and English may be a favorite subject, since Pisces is a good story-teller. They love words, and poetry often enchants them. Neptunians may find math hard to understand at first, but they'll have an uncanny grasp of the abstract theories behind algebra and geometry later on.

There may be a lack of responsibility, which can be frustrating. Pisces children follow their own rules. They're sensitive and easily stabbed to the quick by harshness. Tears may be frequent. These youngsters ordinarily prefer the company of adults to playing with other children. Even at a tender age, they have a deep wisdom and sympathetic understanding of situations over their heads. A child of Neptune is often accused of lying, yet they aren't lies to him. There's no malicious or cowardly intent. His young mind swims in fluid imagination which whispers a thousand secrets, so utterly delightful and filled with such sheer beauty, he can't help trying to make them live in the cold, real world. The fact that these lovely dreams soon die in the sterile, arid soil of a materialistic society is heartbreaking. He needs your deepest pity, or he'll retreat into silent, moody despair.

The Piscean child hears songs of the sea he can never describe. The cold, ugly, naked truth is too brutal for him to bear. He must dress it up occasionally or try to warm it and color it with Neptune shades of romance. It's not fair to call it lying. Instead, encourage him to gather all his clouds and moonbeams and weave them into poems, plays or paintings. Soon enough, he'll learn to adapt to the normal world of brutality, selfishness, cruelty and greed. Why thrust him into it rudely? He may have trouble learning to conform to social and scholastic demands that stifle his individuality. But his parents and teachers can learn from him the value of compassion, understanding, beauty, tolerance, imagination and gentleness. It all depends on the kind of diploma you want from life.

Someday, either the Piscean philosophy of freedom of expression or the conformist concept will win. My money is on Pisces. Of course, your friendly, warm-hearted little Neptunian must be taught that people expect him to adjust eventually to their crazy-quilt, upside-down concepts in order to survive. But if he's shoved too hard by stern, negative adults, he'll lose his way back to the other side of the looking-glass. Don't steal his key. He needs to slip over there now and then, to refresh himself with the true wisdom of the Red Queen and the White Knight. Then he can better cope with the real world of war, poverty, disease, hypocritical ethics and ingratitude. Your little fish needs a cloak of protection against the cold winds to come. Knit it yourself with bright, gay sturdy yarn. Try to understand his Neptune ways. Guide him tenderly, wisely, and when he's tall enough, he may someday suddenly reach out and catch one of his silver stars to bring home to you. Then you'll be glad you didn't laugh at his dreams. Better clear off a spot on the mantle right now.