An Aries woman writes in to tell me she has found an Aries city!
I am an Aries. A girl-ram who likes hanging with my flock, driving red cars that have angry-sounding exhausts and loud stereos. I love my eyebrows defined with a horn-like up-kick to them, hell I even have horns. Yes true, my skull is not oval, I have these pointy bits in line with my ears that jut out at the top of my head. You have to feel them. They’re surreal, but not, because they are real — a lot like LA.
When I left Oz for LA LA, I wrote a farewell email to a work colleague saying “I’m off to Los Angeles, and I’m hoping to find a place so crazy, I feel sane.” and now I’m here I do feel sane. But not because of LA’s craziness more because of LA’s Aries-ness. In this city, I am not alone. I am amongst a sea of kindred sheep who’ve flocked here in the hope of their dreams coming true. Active dreamers. LA is bold and flashy and people accuse it of being false. Or brash. As an Aries woman, I can relate!
It’s also my Mars line in Astrocartography and I HAVE Mars in Aries as well as the Sun. Hence Los Angeles is my Aries city – wham, bam thank you Mars!
Anyway, how can someone who brags saying their Botox Doc is the best in town be false? If they said, “Oh Botox? No! I’m lucky I have good genes” now that’d be false. This is the thing with LA. It doesn’t pretend. People come here chasing a dream and those that don’t make it have to ask themselves how hard they wanted it in the first place. Dream chasing can be rough going. But when the going gets tough, think like a ram. Put your head down and charge.
On my first night in this city, I sat looking out over the velvet black at the sprinkling of city lights that shone like precious gems, and I asked, “LA what have you got for me? Do I have what it takes?” L.A. replied, “I don’t know, give it your best shot. I’m here – what more do you want from me?” And I realized at that moment that L.A. does not bring anything. L.A. is the stage, and her props department is well stocked, but anyone who comes here must be prepared to write their script.
L.A. is Aries. Bold, open, and non-judgemental. Eternally optimistic and ready to action any dream.
by Melanie Camp
Aries in L.A. Uranus in Aires hit my Sun/ Moon conjunction and I leaped. Perfect. I grew up here and moved out fast and saw the world and now back. First time in decades. I hated it when younger but now I’m ready. Love it and exploring everything. After past 13 years living with mean Philly attitude , I’m shocked by so much niceness and the endless sun is weird, but I jumped on stage last night for comedy improv and running around Venice this weekend with crazy photographers.
Oh this post really got the warrior woman in me going. Love the energy, but also the playfulness.
And what a fab pic?!
I’m a Capricorn in Sydney and I think it’s a very good match. The people are driven, hard working, all striving for success but appear like its all too easy, very casual and with an understated elegance. And I love the electric energy pumping just under the surface all the time….
Ahhh, I just wanted to say – what an awesome post! I have no Aries in my chart but some fab Aries friends … and it’s true I think – what some call superficial, others think but just don’t articulate. Aries does, and don’t they shine while they are at it? The world needs beauty just as much as it needs depth and truth. Thanks for sharing Mystic!
Did LA just get kinder, gentler…because that’s not the way I remember it growing up there in the 80’s. ‘Non-judgmental’? Are you kidding me? That is not a word I would use to describe LA. Maybe you’re mistaking the Californian aloofness and indirectness (they’re not gonna tell you what they really think) and self-absorption for non-judgmental attitude. Really, they just can’t be bothered with anyone else but themselves and if they do notice, they’re not gonna verbalize what they think of you, or your un-cool outfit, or whatever.
In California, when people say ‘have a nice day’ they mean ‘fuck you’ and when people in New York say ‘fuck you’ they mean ‘have a nice day’.
NYC = aggressive
Cali = passive-aggressive
I agree what everyone has said about SF. I live in SF currently and people here are assholes, not nice. At all.. and very pretentious, yes. Absurdly expensive, too.
SF = entitled and spoiled brats
another good quote about Los Angeles
“I mean, who would want to live in a place [Los Angeles] where the only cultural advantage is that you can turn right on a red light? -Woody Allen, Annie Hall
“The film business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs”
Hunter S Thompson
I could use to meet some energetic people, I keep bumping into talented, but too stoned or drunk to show up to band meetings/practice flakes. Could use to meet a few professional, yet laid back types.
I am a Virgo with Scorp Rising so it’s hard for me to relate or stay in touch with uber flakes.
Maybe I need to meet some fire sign types?
Which signs tend to be the opposite of Aries?
I guess I’ll have to speak for the Other LA – that is, the non-entertainment focused, more space & technology driven, major port city to the Pacific, home to non-white migrants LA. Yep, that side. I’ve lived here for almost 20 years, having moved here at 23 from SE Asia and while LA is the LA we see in the movies and tv, it’s a city that does wear quite a few faces.
Sub-cultures are strong here, you could in fact live an entire lifetime not even being aware or paying mind to anything Hollywood or vice versa. You have the beaches, some are quiet (Manhattan, Redondo), some are not (Venice), filled with surfers & X game fanatics. There are men in these cities where shoes are only ever worn for interviews, weddings or funerals, though this is thankfully changing.
You have the San Fernando Valley, haven of porn films, which is also a gateway to loads of outlying suburbs, filled mainly with families, but also meth labs and swing clubs. West Hollywood with its concentration of synagogues, Orthodox Jewish schools as well as all the gay-friendly places. Let’s face it, no matter how “progressive” people think LA is, we still have Orange County which probably had a high concentration of the vote no on gay marriage. Speaking of, yes the OC, home of sand, surf, the blondified hard-titted fake-nailed over-embellished super-tanned original housewives, and a whole contingent of my people (Asians).
You have downtown where immigration offices, lawyers and finance are, the Staples Center for sports and concerts, entire streets coming back to life even while connected to Skid Row and being adjacent to the over-crowded County Jail. And of course Santa Monica, where there’s beach, art and nearby museums.
In between all that, you have communities you can walk into where you’d be better off speaking either Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean or Thai rather than English. And the port of Long Beach, where the Queen Mary sits muskily watching all sorts of things come in from the Pacific. Humming through all that are aerospace & aviation companies like Spacex, Northrop, Boeing, etc. quietly working away in the background – LA is a major hub for airlines, and military bases. We don’t have fireflies but we do have a pretty crowded smog filled sky where planes hover waiting to land.
Is this LA bold and brash? I guess I don’t see it that way, to some people it’s an extension of Mexico since technically it used be part of it – in my workplace, I am THE single Asian person, there are 4 caucasians and the rest are Hispanic.
It IS fast-paced across industries but it’s also kind in a way where yes, very few people here are native Angelenos and there’s this understanding that you’re here because you HAD to come here, whether it was work or family, a vineyard or a movie, a plane or a boat, surfing, sex or surgery. A lark or pure survival.
I know when I speak to someone in the entertainment field, LA is often seen as THAT, it’s a major identifier. But it’s really so much more, and to be honest, it’s one of those places you’re likely to get 10 vastly different stories from depending on who you ask. Maybe Hollywood is an Aries, but the rest of the places, I’m not so sure.
Ohmigod haha.. did you used to have the Valley Girl accent? I was married to a native Angeleno so it’s usually with patient humor that most of the LA lifers sort of nod when LA is talked about and presumed to be mainly about entertainment.
The studios are in Hollywood, Burbank and there’s one in Manhattan Beach which is like 2 miles away from me, but for the most part, life is life, we all just love the weather and the accessibility of most things (sand, snow) being not difficult at all. But Melanie is right, like New York, LA brings nothing to no one. It’s just for a lot of us, it’s in very much less glamorous and artistic circumstances.
I also thought this post was very “Aries” inspired:
That last picture shows that LA has all I need to age gracefully, lol.
U want more “Aries Energy”? Check the daily mystic just emailed two seconds ago – UNTOLD Aries energy coming your way…
Thank God, its about time I get a written offer. I know its still merc retro, but nothing has been moving. I’m tired of the murkiness. Let’s do this!
OMG – I just read the dailies. Love the gif! Love that you used the work murk!
Dia Ramzilla checking in! When I recall my visits to LA, what surfaces first are the encounters with the worst scum on earth, from CEOs to pizza boys, getting their dream-kicks by utterly and brazenly not giving a fuq that they share this world with other humans. LOW aries is the WORST OF ALL. But the more I think about it, I DO like L.A.!!! I actually ADORE Hollywood, it actually reminds me a lot of Portland Oregon (not exactly but many comparisons are tres valid) Venice is rad, hell I even like Inglewood. There is total honesty in there, and the high vibrational peeps in these places are the most beautiful souls ever!!! Like she said, there is kinda no fakeness in LA, least of all in Inglewood…
Hmmm, when I was 19 I landed in LA on my way back home to Sydney from the ME. It was supposed to be a 3hr transit and turned into a 3 day transit cause of airline bumbling. I was broke, expecting to be home sooner etc. The only place I could afford a room was Inglewood, this was1979. Those 3 days were very eye opening for a young man from the Sydney suburbs. I arrived there at night and when I stepped out in to the street the next morning (probably wearing thongs and board shorts) I was confronted with a road I couldn’t cross, it was fuqing 8 lanes wide, a pretty baffled community of afro americans who were obviously wondering why the hell is this weird white guy walking down the street ? It was explained later that only hobos and prostitutes actually walk anywhere, and the delights of the first breakfast fast food joint I had ever seen (or imagined).
After 3 days I had succeeded in fitting in quite nicely thank you very much. I would love to go back 2013 and see it again.
I’ve been a few times after to LA but that was the most memorable one.
hahaha I would have loved to see that! 19y.o. DL, boardies and pluggers, strange corner of LA, fresh from the whatever the ME was like back then – hostage crises, peace treaties, revolutions…? and more. what a journey that would have been 🙂
my first trip to inglewood I was seven months pregnant, my flight to LA had arrived at 10pm and my friend had hooked me up with a room at the Inglewood Best Western. Picture me, pregnant and very white, riding the elevator up to me room with five african american girls who were on, I don’t even know, PCP or something. I got settled into my room to realize there were literally no options for food delivery after midnight. I looked out my window and saw a convenience store across the street. I decided that I was not gonna be afraid, and anyone who saw me out on the street would be too baffled to approach me, and I was right. I had the clerk fetch me some fruit, protein bars, and cup-o-noodles under the bulletproof glass and he didn’t charge me a dime. I returned to Inglewood to take my paramedic exam in 2007 and the young men of the Inglewood Fire Department were some of the most beautiful souls I’ve ever encountered. <3
Fakeness in the hood? Definitely not. If you love Inglewood, then honey I believe you, you really do love LA.
You mean I wasn’t your first Aries subscriber !!??!!
Of course she meant every Aries subscriber is the first Aries subscriber. 🙂
bwahahha but of course.
astro-logic 😀
damn right lol!
fuq yeah Aries!
about finding a place crazy enough for you to feel sane – I UNDERSTAND! But in my case it was finding *people* crazy enough to be sane, as the place itself was so isolated we were the only 20 people for about 80km in any direction – true 🙂 ..and it was renegade bliss.
I always seem to have fun and luck when I am living out of my home town (where I am back at the moment). I think I like blazing epicentres of existence (Paris, LA – never been to LA btw – and I’d check out Miami) – you know, LIFE. And the other extreme, rugged outdoors things – deserted coastlines, small fishing villages, climbing mountains, bush trails. Suburbia and chain stores? GAG
blazing epicentres of existence also including non-western cities 🙂
Dude, that’s my new mantra … Blazing Epicenters of Existence …
How inspiring!
I had another loony attmept to smack me down and put me in my place this weekend for being too much of an aries. Having a grown woman scream ‘F*CK YOU’ in the middle of a dance class is quite shocking. This lady hates me because I am open and easy going and HAPPY! Wow.
So I have been feeling a little frazzled.
This wee piece of writing makes me feel so much better. We can’t help being fantastic can we? Is it conceited to think you are awesome, to love life?
I think the lass (all I know is she was born in october) sees me as competition, but I don’t compete, I AM.
I really want to go to LA now, and I will defo get a bit of facework work done while I am there! Just because I am a bit vain and want to look my best.
I have upset so many people over my life for being an Aries. Nearly had my head punched in by grown men, had women scream at me, and I am tiny! I am 5 ft tall, a girl and look quite young for 40 (have always looked girlish). I think people are incredibly offended by my presence and that someone so small can be talented and wise and happy.
I have been called conceited and stuck up, proud and greedy. I am not really, I am just open about what skills I have, I have little need for lots of money, but I do tend be first in line, even though I let people with smaller trolleys go first???
LA hey….
Surround yourself with Aquarian buddies, I find they genuinely enjoy full on Aries energy, and nothing shocks ’em
Hmm between Aquarians and Librans, I know some of each that adore/worship Aries power, likewise some of each that think our brashness makes us “Tacky Jackie”
saggi? they’re good for handling Rams. maybe it’s the Livestock synergy – see also Taurus, Capricorn 😀
I just had a thought – maybe this is why pisces and toro get along so well – surf n turf! bahahah
it’s a hornicopia of awesome
I’m adoring Aries energy right now. It serves me well.
Sort of in the vein of wishy washy over-abundant pisces vibes but must mention how freaky and delightfully accurate the oracle has been lately.
Now the pragmatist in me says this is a result of a cosmic communication with the universe reflecting the reality I already know is the highest option back at myself. Thus when I test it with: do i continue lusty dangerous affair with A? or keep nurturing soulful deep connection with B?
I get answers like “with no string attached, its impossible, etc. for A. And for B I get “this is your soulmate” over and over. Is the oracle broken maybe or the universe is really trying to tell me something.
Either way, When Mars transits my Jupiter in Aries I won’t need oracles….
I’ll just go take whatever the fuq I want! All I needed was permission.
just read astrbarry’s take on Mars in Aries and I agree it’s exciting. I welcome it after the overload of planets pisces. It’s time for firey action again!!
I love LA, it has a beach where one can cycle or rollerskate their way along the espy in the warmth of the sunshine which is out in winter too. Mel is right about LA. But I love NYC also, its harder and tougher, and your boss is definitely meaner. I love an edge.
Congrats Mel on making your dreams come true and on being an awesome Aries!
I’m hoping to permanently reside on the east coast by August.
Very much how I see L.A. as well. I’ve always explained to my non-LA, European family and friends that LA is what you make of it. Every morning you wake up to a blank page. It’s simultaneously and inspiring and exhausting thought.
my cityyyyyy!
hahahaha love the juxtaposition of the two businesses in the 2nd pic. absolutely perfect. 🙂
i spent 6 weeks in la once. it ate me. oh well!
love LA also
I was only there for 5 days a fair few years ago, but I loved the vibe. What I loved probably most was that it was NOT glamorous, shiny, perfect (image of Hollywood from abroad) but very gritty, everyday, down to earth, and as Mel says, a place where you have to work to make your dreams come true.
But I could feel myself being inspired just being there. As a mega-Leo with most of that in 6th house, the combination of stage- theatre – films – creative work plus WORK – just the inspirational environment – I loved it, it would make you get your butt into gear.
Hope you keep making it work for you Mel!
As to the other post – Sydney – for 12 months – how could you go wrong? The main issue is, it is now the 2nd (?I think) most expensive city in the world. If someone else is paying, that’s not really an issue. But yes, come to Australia, how could that be a bad thing for 12 months? Sydney is beautiful but as someone from a smaller city, I can find it overwhelming after not too long… you need a set of friends to bring you back down to earth.
YES!!! I am from Santa Cruz and moved to San Francisco for a few years. People from San Francisco think they are so much more artsy and cultured and smart and “real” than LA but I found San Francisco extremely pretentious and try-hard-y. Really fake and everyone is afraid of one another.
I lived in LA for the first time in my life in early 2011, only briefly. I loved it. Everyone is alive, they’re trying to make stuff happen, they’re confident and invest in themselves because they have to believe in themselves to make it and people actually do want to help one another out because the whole town runs on favors and giving people a shot. I miss my short time in Echo Park and I hope to move back and be settled into a home I love by next year. I want to re-read “Paint it Black” by Janet Fitch to get excited about my dream of moving back again.
If that is you and your Aries throne I am so jealous, what an amazing office and desk!!! And the red pumps…very Aries. Are those the YSL Tributes?
I had a similar experience in San Fran. I was told by many of the artsy-elite that i would love it, but i did not. It’s not just you. People are so angry stomping around really fast on coffee buzzes, so preoccupied with themselves. I couldn’t wait to leave. But great sushi and art places.
I can’t wait to visit LA. I’ve been told I’ll either love it or hate it.
SF has its merits (such good food, it’s mind-boggling, such a great transportation system … great access to nature up in Marin County), but there is a level of pretentiousness that’s tangible.
I would happily take LA any day of the week.
oh totally…best sushi i have ever had was in SF. I was amazed to find out that saba actually tastes good and doesn’t stink. And yes, not really needing to drive anywhere was a relief. I really liked the public transportation system. The smell of the Pacific Ocean which smells different than the Atlantic or Gulf of Mexico.
Really good things there, it was more the people I was disappointed with which is why if I have to go West Coast it will be Seattle or Portland.
I can’t wait to go to LA. because I haven’t tried it yet. Half of my friends are like you’ll love it and another half has told me I’ll hate it. The only way to find out is to go.
I wasn’t impressed with Las Vegas either.
Yeah, it’s the driving part of LA that really kills me…and yes, it’s basically a paradise for coffee and food lovers. I <3 Ritual coffee.
yeah, good beta, I’ve been wishing for this job callback from san fran but maybe i’ll need to reassess. Never been to either, I’d rather stay away from pretenses and I’m allergic to hipsters. i’m the gritty space cowboy type. I’ll try LA first. I almost got to move to san bernadino but that fell through. anyways, I spent the last year in the rockies, time to give the coast a try.
if you haven’t tried it yet, astrodienst has a map feature where you can see what planetary lines go through what cities relative to your natal chart. If you choose the Scalable Google Map you can zoom in really close.
hmm, I guess SF is close to the chiron/MC line. Sounds a bit like rejuvinating the part of my image lacking the recognition and individuality it needs. NN type of prominence.
Ohhhh. Think I need to try that one.
feel the same way. South Park described it fart sniffery.
Very pretentious unhappy people. Sadly enough.
Interesting. Last summer I tried to relocate there. It’s on my Saturn line. The company I was in negotiations with went out of business. I really dodged a bullet on that one.
HAHAHA!!!
I live in SF and had avoided moving here for decades and finally ended up here. Like my English friend here says, “this city is so up itself!” …..and it is. Really bugs me, there’s a harshness here too, and it’s damned expensive, but I’m here for now… *sigh*
I lived in Santa Cruz for over 20 years and didn’t want to leave or have to leave but chose to leave for career purposes. I miss it…. 🙁
Grew up in LA and lived there only as a kid and teen, so don’t know what it’s truly like to live there as an adult, but I left there as soon as I could (this was back in the 80’s). My parents still live there…. Every time I go back to visit I just can’t connect with the vibe…. I’m really just not a city person…..SF, LA, or otherwise…
Piscean moon in the 9th house….. I love nature and I MISS MY REDWOODS in the Santa Cruz mountains!!! *cries*
Despite any Virgo who tells you Lake Mead’s gonna dry up, cancer from smog, no good neighborhoods, expensive as hell, traffic, gas prices-I could never live in Boise. This ram is here with the crazy, deluded, arrogant, yet diverse and real LA. So true. If someone says they got good genes, BS! If they’re still a virgin, ha BS! I feel safer here than down south any day.
Mmmm, nice description. I’m an LA transplant from NYC and the minute I got here, I loved it. It’s a polarizing place … either you love it, or you hate it.
It’s definitely a city full of dreamers, and there’s an optimism that comes from others, too … they’re like “Pursue your dream … happy to connect you to someone who knows someone, who knows someone … but what happens after that is up to you.”
On the other hand, all that dreaminess can make some people feel like LA has the ultimate slacker vibe.
Meanwhile, I’ve been offered the opportunity to make the opposite trek as Ms. Aries. Company is working out a 12-month stint in Oz (Sydney, specifically). Have definitely always “considered” Oz as like an “awesome place to visit someday” (I’m Saggo, the thought of the wildness and adventure seems synonymous with Australia).
But now it’s coming up as an option of REALLY living there. Kind of crazy. And scary. Wondering … how might one describe Sydney, if they had to? And as a girl who grew up in NYC, then has grown into my “womanhood” in LA, do you think I’d like life in Sydney?
Yeah, I love that everyone wants to help! Most of those offers will be a bust but the culture of people trying to hook one another up breeds a lot of amazing synchronicity, even if most people are flakes.
I don’t know if you’d like Sydney. We try to be friendly and practical. We don’t like bullshit or bullshitters. There’s plenty to do and see here and it can be both hectic or quiet depending on the time of day/day of the week/what’s going on. If you can handle a place where lots of shops are shut on Sundays and if you like nice green parks and lots of tiny municipalities all squished together like their own little towns (each with a pub, post office etc) then Sydney might be for you.
I reckon a year in Sydney would be alright for A NY/LA girl!
You could organise your weekends to take little trips out of town and do some exploring. There is a lot of natural beauty around Sydney (in Australia generally) and you could fly to Melb or Hobart for the weekend. In terms of art galleries and museums, and restaurants and fashion, you would have seen it all in NY (not that it is bad in Syd, butthe population is much bigger in NY)….here the food is good and fresh, summers near the beach are great.
Different beach life to LA, what I recalled from my time in LA is that at Venice Beach, there was all kinds of (good) exciting crazy stuff going on but no good fruit and veg shop, or lovely florist handy. Sydney is very lifestyle(?) oriented…
You will love it! At least my friends who are here from L.a love it but they live in Bondi or Tamarama. And of course shops are bloody well open on sunday, where is that they are not?
Thanks all of you for your responses. 🙂 I moved to LA because I fell in love with the idea of nature and the city coexsiting, if that makes any sense. Yes, it’s a smoggy, trafficy, Botoxy place, but in just 20 mins or so, I can get into a mini forest, or some great craggy rocks for a hike … and in just 2 hours I can hit a vast desert to chill the fuq out. So it sounds like Sydney might be similar …
I’ve heard that the food scene is great (natural & organic), which is important for me, as I’ve become very “LA” in the sense that it’s important to me to know where the food came from, and to try my hardest to eat less animals + carbs. (Doesn’t always work, but still …)
I would definitely plan to take weekend trips and hit Melbourne & Brisbane, and of course the Great Barrier Reef, and maybe even a week in NZ.
Thank again for your insight. 🙂 This is definitely getting the Saggo adventurer in me a’goin!!!!
And that was me, up there. Posted too quickly …
Flipping LOVE this attitude, incredibly invigorating. Loveitloveitlovit.
I cannot flipping wait for Mars to VaVaVoom into Aries! I’m very watery, with my Jupiter in Leo trining my pisces moon and my neptune, But I’m a Saggo dammit, and I’ve certain incendiary needs, ya know? I’ve been drowning with all this Pisces energy and I’m ready to rocket to Mars.
Mel is right LA is for active dreamers. You can be inactive dreamer but you’re going to go home with your tail between your legs. It’s a hustle here – all day everyday. I moved from OZ too (doesn’t everyone, no one who lives here is from here). Professionals with an intense work ethic can really thrive but they’ll work you from A to Z and then back again. It ain’t for the faint of heart. I think people get easily seduced by the big glitzy flashy dream but if you don’t have the stamina it’s going to grind you down to a pulp. And you won’t be able to pay your rent. There is nothing worse than being a broke 20 or 30 something in Los Angeles, especially for a woman. When I moved here I found my inner warrior fast (Mars in Virgo) and thank god or I’d be on the first bus back to my old life (barf).
I’m so looking forward to this week….bring on the Mars in Aries!!