> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # The Flow State Herald: Edition 3, the Maester (Cancer rising) - URL: https://the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io/week-2026-10-24-cancer/ - Published: 2026-10-24T15:50:09.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-24T15:50:10.000Z - Author: Flow Flower # The Flow State Herald 24 to 31 October 2026 · Edition 3 · Vol. I · No. 3 The Maester's edition, for Cancer rising [](https://clevelandart.org/art/1989.87?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) Boating in Moonlight, 1600s, Korea, Joseon dynasty (1392–1910), album leaf; ink on silk, The Cleveland Museum of Art. [Museum page](https://clevelandart.org/art/1989.87?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). Moonlight on open water, and a small boat carrying a teapot, a potted plant and a stringed instrument: a whole household afloat. How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act 5, scene 1 ([text](https://rpo.library.utoronto.ca/poems/merchant-venice-excerpts-how-sweet-moonlight-sleeps-upon-bank?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io)) Read this first - **The week:** Venus backs into Libra on Sunday, the Sun squares Pluto on Monday, Mercury squares Mars on Friday. - **For you:** The Bedchamber, 4th house: Venus sits there all week and gives the household a second look. - **Dates:** Sun 25 Oct, 5:09 am ET; Mon 26 Oct, 8:11 am ET; Fri 30 Oct, 1:20 pm ET. New here? Your chart is a castle of twelve rooms, explained on the [castle page](https://the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io/castle/). [Album of the week](#album)[Your sky](#sky)[Tarot](#tarot)[Planet of the week](#planet)[Museum object](#museum)[The long read](#long)[This week's calendar](#calendar)[Take this with you](#take) [](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/40526?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) ## Album of the week **Colour Green**, Sibylle Baier, 2006\. . [Listen on Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/album/1lf3rLmrO0ObMieg4YqEuB?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colour%5FGreen?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). Baier, a German actress who appeared in Wim Wenders's Alice in the Cities (1973), recorded these songs at home on reel-to-reel tape between 1970 and 1973, then left music to raise a family in the United States. Her son later made a CD of the tapes for the family, a copy reached J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr, and the label Orange Twin released it in 2006. ## The Moon Book: your sky this week You are the Maester, keeper of the household records, and on Sunday Venus walks back into the home wing of your chart. Venus, retrograde, backs into Libra early on Sunday, which puts it in your 4th house of home, family and roots; it ends the week in Libra. On Monday the Sun, in Scorpio, in your 5th house of creativity and pleasure, squares Pluto in Aquarius, in your 8th house of shared money, debts and endings. That is friction between what you are making and what is jointly owed or held. Mercury is retrograde in your 5th house all week, so anything creative or romantic you started recently is open to revision. On Friday Mercury, in Scorpio, squares Mars in Leo, in your 2nd house of money, food and what you value, and the revised plan meets its price. Which room in your home has gone longest without anyone fixing anything? Sat24 Sun25♀︎ Venus to Libra Mon26☉︎ Sun sq Pluto Tue27 Wed28 Thu29 Fri30☿︎ Mercury sq Mars Sun 25 Oct ### Venus returns to Libra · Sun 25 Oct, 5:09 am ET (09:09 UTC) **THE BEDCHAMBER** · 4th house · home, family and roots Venus, retrograde, crosses back into Libra and spends the week moving backward through it. Libra is your 4th house, which covers home, family and roots, so affection, taste and spending now run through the household. In the Bedchamber, Venus goes back over what is already there: the bed you never replaced, the window that leaks in November, the spare key a relative still holds. Things put up with for years get a second look, and repairs fit this stretch better than new purchases. ♀︎ Venus (retrograde) in Libra, your 4th house Mon 26 Oct ### The Sun squares Pluto · Mon 26 Oct, 8:11 am ET (12:11 UTC) **THE GARDEN AND BALLROOM** · 5th house · play, romance, creativity and pleasure **THE VAULT** · 8th house · shared resources, debts, endings and what is hidden The Sun in Scorpio squares Pluto in Aquarius. The Sun is in your 5th house of creativity, romance and play, Pluto in your 8th house of shared money, debts and endings, so what you make meets what is owed. In the Garden and Ballroom, something you are making or enjoying runs into the Vault, where joint accounts and old obligations sit. A shared project may need a joint decision, or a loan may come up for repayment. ☉︎ Sun in Scorpio, your 5th house, square ♇︎ Pluto in Aquarius, your 8th house Fri 30 Oct ### Mercury squares Mars · Fri 30 Oct, 1:20 pm ET (17:20 UTC) **THE GARDEN AND BALLROOM** · 5th house **THE TREASURY AND PANTRY** · 2nd house · money, food, what you value Mercury, retrograde in Scorpio, squares Mars in Leo. Mercury is in your 5th house of creativity and pleasure, Mars in your 2nd house of money, food and what you value, so a revised plan meets its cost. In the Treasury and Pantry, Mars pushes the spending while Mercury is still rechecking. A quote for a repair or the shopping for a gathering is where tempers could show, so the total gets read twice before anything is paid. ☿︎ Mercury (retrograde) in Scorpio, your 5th house, square ♂︎ Mars in Leo, your 2nd house In the Bedchamber, Venus goes back over what is already there: the bed you never replaced, the window that leaks in November, the spare key a relative still holds. ## Tarot What deserves protecting? Nine of Wands, upright **Resilience, guarding, the last stretch.** The Nine of Wands is the card of resilience: someone wounded, wary and still standing guard, close to the end of a long effort. Upright, it says the last stretch is the hardest. With Venus back in Libra on Sunday, what deserves protecting is the thing you have defended longest and are nearly through with. What do you remember? Nine of Swords, reversed **Easing anxiety, release, perspective.** The Nine of Swords is the card of dread and sleepless worry. Reversed, the worry is loosening and much of it turns out to have been imagined or exaggerated. On Monday, when the Sun squares Pluto, you remember the hard stretch more kindly than it felt, with the fear shrinking to size. What are you ready to release? The Emperor, reversed **Rigid control, rules, loosening authority.** The Emperor is the card of structure, authority and rules. Reversed, the control has hardened into rigidity or slipped away altogether. With Mercury squaring Mars on Friday, you can release a rule you set for yourself and have been enforcing on everyone else. Cards: Pamela Colman Smith, Rider-Waite-Smith tarot, 1909. ## Planet of the week On Sunday Venus, retrograde, moves back from Scorpio into Libra. The Dresden Codex, a Maya book of folded bark paper now kept in Dresden, Germany, gives pages 46 to 50 to Venus. Its table counts a cycle of 584 days in four stages: morning star, hidden, the star seen at dusk, hidden again. The true figure is 583.92 days. Five cycles come to 2,920 days, exactly eight 365-day years. The surviving book is usually dated to the 11th or 12th century and was probably copied from older material. It has been in the Saxon State Library since 1739\. [Source](https://mayan.org/myths/dresden-codex-astronomy/?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) [](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/662967?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) Vessel with mythological scene, 600–800 CE, Maya, Ceramic, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. [Museum page](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/662967?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). A painted Maya vessel, 600 to 800 CE; the record names it as a vessel with a mythological scene and does not link it to Venus. ## Museum object [](https://clevelandart.org/art/1917.426?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) Cradle Basket, c 1875– 1910, California, Yurok or Hupa, Late 19th century, twined, The Cleveland Museum of Art. [Museum page](https://clevelandart.org/art/1917.426?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). A cradle basket, twined, from Yurok or Hupa makers in California. The Cleveland Museum of Art's record dates it to about 1875 to 1910 and gives no individual maker. It is long and narrow, with a looped handle at the head and a smooth wrapped rim, and the sides are open: rows of fine twining hold stiff vertical rods apart, leaving gaps you can see through. In twining, two flexible strands twist around each other as they cross each rod, locking it in place. The rows here sit wide apart along the body and tighten at the foot, where the weave closes into a solid cup. A small red bead shows near the upper edge on the right. The Yurok live along the lower Klamath River and the Hupa in the Hoopa Valley on the Trinity. Their basketry traditions are closely related, and the record gives the attribution as 'Yurok or Hupa'. ## The long read In 1507, as the [World History Encyclopedia](https://www.worldhistory.org/article/866/the-aztec-new-fire-ceremony/?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) tells it, every fire in the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan was put out. Hearthstones and cooking pots were thrown away, houses were swept, and families waited on their roofs while priests climbed a hill called Huixachtlan, now Cerro de la Estrella in Mexico City, to watch the Pleiades. The Aztecs called that cluster Tianquiztli, usually glossed as 'marketplace'. Why that year? The timing is arithmetic. The Aztecs ran a 260-day ritual count beside a 365-day solar year, and the two return to the same starting pair after 18,980 days: 52 x 365 and 73 x 260 both give that number. The ceremony, called the Binding of the Years, marked the turn of each 52-year round. Known ceremonies fell in 1351, 1403, 1455 and 1507, according to the [Museo del Fuego Nuevo](https://mexicocity.cdmx.gob.mx/venues/museo-fuego-nuevo/?lang=en&ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io), and 1507, under Motecuhzoma II, was the last before Tenochtitlan fell in 1521. What people feared is reported, not observed. The Spanish friar Bernardino de Sahagun recorded in the Florentine Codex that the sun might not rise again and that star-demons, the tzitzimime, would come down. That is the belief as one friar recorded it. Accounts say the new fire was kindled when the Pleiades crossed the meridian at midnight, on the chest of a sacrificed captive, and runners then carried pine torches to the temple on the Templo Mayor and on to the hearths of the city. From the temple the fire went out to every household, and the ceremony ended when each home had a lit hearth again. By late autumn the Pleiades are high in the sky at midnight, which fits the season of the ceremony. [](https://clevelandart.org/art/1921.1711?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) Mother-and-Child Figurine, 1325–1521, Mexico, Aztec, Ceramic, pigment, The Cleveland Museum of Art. [Museum page](https://clevelandart.org/art/1921.1711?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). A ceramic Aztec figure of a woman holding a child, 1325 to 1521 by the museum's dating; the record does not connect it to the ceremony. Go further: [Florentine Codex, Book 7: The Sun, Moon, and Stars, and the Binding of the Years](https://wp.lib.utah.edu/florentine-codex-book-7/?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) ## This week's calendar - **Sat 24 Oct:** **Jewish: Shabbat Lech-Lecha:** Congregations read the passage in Genesis where Abram is told to leave his country for a land he will be shown. [Source](https://hebcal.com/s/lechlecha?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). - **Mon 26 Oct:** **Hindu: Sharad Purnima:** Families leave kheer, a rice pudding, out in the moonlight, eat it the next morning and light lamps for Lakshmi. [Source](https://www.smartpuja.com/blog/sharad-purnima-2026-ashwin-purnima/?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). - **Mon 26 Oct:** **Buddhist: Pavarana Day:** Monks end the rains retreat by inviting one another to point out faults, and laypeople offer robes and light lamps. [Source](https://www.reonline.org.uk/festival%5Fevent/pavarana-day/?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). - **Wed 28 Oct:** **Hindu: Karwa Chauth:** Married women fast from sunrise until the moon is sighted, after a meal before dawn called sargi. [Source](https://hindutone.com/festivals/karwa-chauth-2026-canada-moonrise-time-city-wise/?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). [](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/937064?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) Sabbath lamp, 1771, Silver: chased, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. [Museum page](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/937064?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io). A silver Sabbath lamp, 1771, of the hanging kind lit to begin Shabbat. ## Take this with you When did the stove or boiler in your home last go out, and who relit it? [](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/40526?ref=the-flow-state-herald.ghost.io) Border: Box decorated with flowers and clouds, Korea, 18th century. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. ## How this was made Times are Eastern (ET), with UTC in brackets. The sky is calculated with the Swiss Ephemeris. Pictures come from museum open access collections and are credited in each caption. For reflection and enjoyment, not medical, financial or legal advice.