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(Beth Hoeckel / For The Times)
June is a feeling that floats at the forefront of every Angeleno’s mind at some point or another in the months leading up to it. Whether it’s the flickering memory of dancing to cumbias antiguas at the backyard asada for your best friend’s birthday, or the solar warmth of those first few hot days embedding itself in your skin on a Sunday at Topanga as you watch the surfers, June can be an ocean of comfort to the winter-weary mind and soul. The energy of Cancer, which presides over the second half of this moonlit month, tells us that sometimes the secret to comfort is also the secret to happiness, and that it involves three things: bathing in the sea, basking in your home, and forgiving your mom.
Homemaking is an art, a craft, a practice, a burden, a necessity, a privilege. It’s in the talismans that we arrange within our homes — including our house keys.
It’s no wonder that this time of year brings some of our deepest sentiments to the surface — it is the only astrological sign ruled by the moon, whose gravitational pull is in constant interaction with the 60% of the human body that is made up of water. Not just a water sign, but the water sign, some would say, Cancer has liquid depths that serve to remind us that the heart is at once delicate and meant to be felt, not known.
The energy of Cancer tells us that sometimes the secret to comfort is also the secret to happiness, and that it involves three things: bathing in the sea, basking in your home, and forgiving your mom.
Could it be, also, that the heart is meant to be consumed? We see a potent metaphor for the fourth sign of the zodiac in the Mono Silver Zeug cutlery set — a shiny smattering of tools for that sacred source of comfort: eating. The stainless-steel set has a softly brushed exterior, an at-once blunt and tender combination fitting for a Cancer. Named zeug after the German word for “stuff,” the utensil is a mediator for the intimacy of the hand-to-mouth gesture. A Cancer, like this set of utensils, is sharp. As the protective mother figure of the zodiac, the Cancer doles out moments of tenderness to those they deem trustworthy in environments in which they feel safe (and their standards for safety are elevated and nuanced), and barbs of cold, sharp moonlight to those they perceive as a threat to themselves, but more often their homes or someone they love.
We all, like knives, need to be held closely and gripped tightly. An icy skinny dip in the ocean under a full moon as you breathe a prayer. A mother-figure friend kissing the top of your head as she places soul-reviving homemade soup in front of you. A lovingly acquired brushed-steel spoon that you can cradle between your forefinger and thumb and use to collect all your tears about everything, everyone, everywhere, because why is it all so hard? Why doesn’t the world protect softness? Ultimately it must protect itself and those it loves. It’s a sacred vocation, as vulnerability must be protected at all costs. It’s what makes us not just humans of flesh and water, but souls. This Cancer season, allow yourself to plunge into deep, heaping forkfuls of the comfort your heart yearns for — treating yourself like a delicate alloy of light and spirit will make you strong.
Goth Shakira is a digital conjurer based in Los Angeles.
