The ASTRO motel (in Waco, I believe).
ASTRO motel
Instate 35 — I-35, or just “Thirty-Five” — runs like a giant juggernaut from Laredo to Chicago. Salient points for me, the division 35 created in old Austin. East Austin is hip, trendy and cool (again), but at one time, it was a more barrio — or ghetto — to many.
As I transitioned from “computer consultant” to “astrological consultant,” I spent a year or more commuting up and down 35, Austin to Dallas and back again. On the side of the road, I’d always see the “ASTRO motel,” and I wonder. Looked a little seedy, bit down on its luck, but not altogether bad. Like a Motel 6, only no longer part of a chain.
I can’t recall exactly when as I’ve gotten to where I refuse to drive that stretch of highway, but the name changes, with a banner draped over the old sign. However, I think it’s back, but I haven’t been on that road in more than a year.
The name itself, more than anything else, intrigued me. I’ve always wondered about motel as a metaphor. 12 rooms, 12 signs, 12 occupants to show what that sign might be like? Try turning the arcane science of astrology into a more understandable lingua franca.
With that in mind, the new horoscopes are available now.
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lingua franca…in conversation, I find that when I allude to anything astrological, no matter how lightly, no matter how tangentially, I get one of two extreme responses. Either the person shuts down completely and looks at me like “another crazy old woman” or their face lights up and they want to talk pop psychology. It’s very rare to get a thoughtful, informed response.
I suppose astrology got a bad rap for the same reason psychology did–too many hucksters doing flash and bang, too few who really knew what they were doing. Psychology (mostly rehabilitated itself; I’d like the same to apply to astrology.
One of the formative moments in my career, early on, I got the concept that astrology is nothing more than a language.