Astrology blog
Planets, houses and aspects in plain language — from your first chart to a year-ahead forecast.
CompatibilityTwo o'clock on the 31st of December. The Cancer partner is in the kitchen, putting together a small supper for four — her sister, her sister's husband, the two of them. Candles already on the table at this hour; the music chosen yesterday. The Aquarius partner walks in with his coat still on. "I ...
Oksana Miatova16 min
GuidesThree websites, three slightly different dates for the same sign. One friend swears she's "such a typical Capricorn", another tells you Capricorns are nothing like her. Somewhere in the middle, you'd quite like to know what the twelve zodiac signs actually are, where the dates come from, and whet...
Oksana Miatova18 min
CompatibilitySunday afternoon at the hospital ward. Maya is at the nurses' station with a printed medication chart, working out whether the new dosage clashes with her sister's blood-pressure tablets. Sam is in the side room, holding her sister's hand while a Bake Off rerun plays quietly. Both have been there...
Oksana Miatova15 min
GuidesIt's 11.47 on a Monday night. The alarm goes off in six and a quarter hours. You're lying on your back, eyes open, replaying a phrase from this morning's meeting — what your colleague said, what you said back, what you should probably have said instead, and what he might have meant, and whether t...
Oksana Miatova18 min
PlanetsYou opened your weather app on a Monday morning and noticed it: a thin sliver next to "Waxing Crescent, 14%". Or you scrolled past your astrology app and it told you the moon was full, in a tone faintly implying you ought to do something about that. You'd quite like to know what the phrase means,...
Oksana Miatova14 min
Birth chartYou read your sun-sign description, didn't quite recognise yourself, and wondered what else there was. Or you keep seeing "sun in Scorpio, moon in Pisces, rising in Gemini" on someone's profile and want to know what on earth that's about. Or someone's just told you that a birth chart explains mor...
Oksana Miatova22 min
CompatibilityShe met him in a bereavement group — the local Talking Therapies service ran one for adults who'd lost a parent. She'd lost her father six months earlier; he'd lost his mother the year before. They started having tea after sessions. Four months later they were together, and she was lying in bed a...
Oksana Miatova13 min
GuidesIt's a Tuesday evening in a Clapham café and your partner of two years hasn't answered the message you sent at six. It's now seven. Your stomach has done that small sliding thing it does, and the thought has arrived on its usual schedule: *something's wrong, he's going off me, I can feel it.* You...
Oksana Miatova17 min
GuidesThe hoover packed in halfway through the living room, and that was how Anna ended up sitting on the rug at three on a Sunday afternoon, two-and-a-half years after the divorce went through, realising she could not remember when she had last gone for a proper walk. She used to love walking. Used to...
Oksana Miatova17 min
CompatibilityYou type your sign and your partner's into a compatibility search box, and the internet hands you a verdict in about three seconds. Aries and Cancer — incompatible. Leo and Aquarius — match. Cancer and Cancer — depends who you ask.
Oksana Miatova25 min
CompatibilityShe sends her best friend a screenshot — a small argument, mostly resolved, slightly still itching. Her friend replies with a shrug emoji and "you two are so different though, lol". Twenty minutes later, in bed with the lamp still on, she types `pisces aries love compatibility` into Google. The f...
Oksana Miatova12 min
CompatibilityIt is Saturday morning, six months after you moved in together. He has chosen a small ceramic jug at a craft market because the colour was right. You have relabelled the jars in the cupboard so the lentils actually get used. He bakes bread on Sundays now. You buy the kind of tea he drinks without...
Oksana Miatova18 min