Over the years, I’ve met many people who strongly believed in astrology.
You know: The philosophy that, if you were born on a certain day of the year, all of these wonderful personal characteristics would apply. Like being loyal, and kind, and talented, and ambitious, etc.
Generally, good stuff that we’d all like to believe about ourselves no matter which day of the year we arrived on Earth.
Hardly ever does an astrologer say this or that sign indicates you are cruel, lascivious or generally just nasty.
Nobody wants to hear that.
But there’s only 366 possible birthdays in any given year, and all of us are going to fall under one of those days with its pre-determined astrological attributes.
Let’s take just one for an example -- April 20.
Did you know it’s the birthday of Adolf Hitler, one of history’s most evil people (see World War II)?
Wasn't he cute?
Yes, baby ‘Dolf was born on April 20, but did you know that Ryan O’Neal, Jessica Lange, George Takei and Carmen Electra were also born on that date?
Along with millions of other not-insane people?
Then there’s Dec. 1, MY birthday. It’s a birthday I share with Woody Allen, Bette Midler, Richard Pryor and Sarah Silverman.
I also share the EXACT SAME birthday as renowned Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. Yes, the same day and same year. It boggles my mind to realize that, as my Mom was giving me birth in Iowa, Pablo’s Mom was birthing him in South America.
So while astrologers MIGHT be able to explain away Hitler and Carmen Electra having the same birthday by it not being the same year, what about me and Pablo?
Just so you know, I’ve never been a drug lord or ordered the murder of hundreds if not thousands of people. Nor was Pablo ever an aspiring Pulitzer Prize-seeking journalist, to my knowledge.
Listen: I’m not trying to drive a stake through the heart of astrology here. While it’s certainly not as popular as it was in the much-more-naive 1960s and 1970s, it just won’t die.
Many newspapers still carry the daily horoscope, which seems to say there are still a fair number of astrology believers out there.
And why not? It’s basically all a just-for-fun thing for the not-so-deep-thinkers among us.
So if you want to use it to buy a lottery ticket or seek out a mate from a particular astro sign, please go ahead and do that.
And maybe it’ll all work out. I hear that — occasionally — it does.
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