ISLA VISTA -- THIS ONE IS PERSONAL

On Friday night I turned on the local news hoping to settle down after a long week of mini dramas, when I saw scenes of chaos in IslaVista.   I was numb.  UCSB is my alma mater.  There was a lot of confusion but I could tell this was not going to be good.    When I woke up on Saturday the news was worse than I could have predicted.  Seven people dead, including perpetrator, seven wounded and a small community shocked.   For me this was personal, one of the victims was shot in front of the apartment that I had shared with my three roommates thirty years earlier.  My roommates and I have all reached out to each other.   It may be three decades later but our college life in Isla Vista is seared in our hearts and psyche, it is integral to who we are today and we were all rubbed raw by the news.  

As the information unfolded on Saturday I was not sure I even wanted to look at the astrological chart.   A few months ago there was another sad story in IV (Isla Vista) when a young man rammed his car into innocent people attending a street party.    I chose to skip that chart.  But as more information came out and I looked at the map in the LA Times with red circles numbered 1-10 indicating where people had been hurt or killed, I was transported back in time to when I was a 20 year old coed trying to find my way in life and on a bicycle, going up and down those exact streets with not much more than a joyful heart and the smell of ocean, eucalyptus and tar was in the air.   I couldn’t skip this chart.  

Elliot Rodger, the young man who committed the crimes began his rampage by killing his housemates and their friend using a knife.   We do not know at what time he killed the housemates so we can’t draft a chart for this event.  But we do know the time of the killings when he switched to guns. 

The chart for the rampage started at 9:27pm with the first call to 911 reporting bullets have being just shot.   

The chart has Sagittarius Ascendant, Sun in Gemini and Moon in Aries.  

For the last six months, readers of TracyAstroSalon know we’ve been following the clusterf*%$k  when the Moon is in a cardinal sign forming harsh aspects to Mars, Jupiter, Uranus and Pluto.   I have taken the time to point it out to all my readers each week.     And so it was in this chart---Moon in 3^rd house on top of Uranus.   Third house is the communication house and Moon in rough Aries can be seen in Rodger’s written manifesto and horrible Youtube posts.   

Double downing on the communication was Mercury on the descendent along with the Sun in Gemini.  Reports are that he used social media right up until the events along with calling his therapist and emailing his mother a few minutes before he began his shooting spree.      Sagittarius on the ascendant is also a communication sign but really speaks to the events taking place in a college town, since Sag rules higher education.   Pluto is connected to violence and is in the first house in Capricorn.   Capricorn gets its strength by working through its insecurity.  That is the upside to Cap.  The bad side of Cap is when it is obsessively addicted to its insecurities (think Nixon & Watergate).   This was certainly the case in this chart and with Pluto square Moon (one of the female planets) and square to Mars in Libra, which is at the very top of the chart (MC) connects to Rodger’s rage against women which he put up for the whole world to see:

"I'm 22 years old and still a virgin, never even kissed a girl. And through college, 2 1/2 years, more than that actually, I'm still a virgin. It has been very torturous,” he said. "The popular kids, you never accepted me and now you will all pay for it. Girls, all I ever wanted was to love you, be loved by you. I wanted a girlfriend. I wanted sex, love, affection, adoration.”

In particular his anger was focused against sororities.  He also spoke how lonely it is to live in a beautiful town feeling unloved.    Mars in Libra in harsh aspect to Uranus and Pluto is all over his manifesto.   

Rodger was not a student at UCSB.  He was attending the local community college in Santa Barbara but was living in a university town.   As an alumni of UCSB I can talk with some authority that the university students do not co-mingle much with the city college students.   And frankly it was visa versa as well, my experience was the community college kids lived in Santa Barbara not Isla Vista.   He could have had movie star good looks and a lot of money and it still would have been difficult for him to cross the barrier of a university sorority girl.  It may be shallow but consider any university town and you will see the same hurdles.     I was looking at the Sagittarius Rising and Jupiter in harsh aspect to Uranus and Pluto and I was thinking about his international parents; his mother from Malaysia, his father from Great Britain, his step mother from France and I could not help but think if one of them had been American they may have advised him to not live in the university town.   Sigh. 

On Friday, his therapist got a call from Rodger and then she called his mother to check her email that was sent at 9:17pm, the mother read it and then called her ex-husband.  Both jumped in their car and headed for Isla Vista.   The report is that they did call 911 but while driving north on the 101 they heard about the rampage on the radio.  They could not stop it.   Sun in Gemini square Neptune in Pisces---help slipped through everyone’s fingers.  

For timing we look at Saturn.   In this chart Saturn was in trine with Jupiter and Chiron in Pisces and as hard as it is to believe this is a positive aspect.   Saturn in the 11^th house speaks to groups and associations and it turns out that Rodger pounded on the door of the Alpha Phi house, which was locked and no one would let him in.      Had someone opened the door the casualty rate would have been much higher.   We can thank Saturn. 

The whole story is sad on many levels.   The parents who got called that their child at the beginning of the prime of their life was killed.   The parents of Elliott Rodger who clearly struggled with their son’s condition (ASD) and now the rampage of damage that he did must be unbearable.    For my college roommates and I who look back on that period of our life at UCSB with fondness we are so sad that something so awful has occurred and this is how the world is learning of the small little community which we loved.        I have said it more than once and I’m saying it again, I will be happy when Mars moves out of Libra.   I’m tired of love getting bitch slapped.