How I struck oil on holiday

On Winchelsea Beach, the mud is dark sable. Sometimes, you slither across the top of it. But sometimes your foot sinks right in, mud spurts between your toes. And sometimes, you sink much deeper, over your ankles, up to the knees. When that happens, your feet encounter another texture, silkier than the ordinary mud, yet more delicious. You pull your foot out and it's covered with thick black goo, much, much deeper and darker in colour than the rest of the mud. It's darker than the darkest chocolate, absolute black.

Yes, you have struck oil.

My children and I struck oil daily a couple of week ago, which set me thinking about the black stuff and what the planets have to say about it.

John D Rockefeller Sr painted by John Singer Sargent.
He was the first  US oil magnate: naturally Neptune is the
closest planet to the career angle of his chart.

Now, according to the astrology textbooks, oil is ruled by Neptune. So why would that be? It's because Neptune rules liquids. But just because it says so in the book, doesn't mean I have to believe it.

So I thought I'd check it out. The thing that really set me on this trail is the fact that next year, Neptune is moving back into its own sign, Pisces, for the first time in 160 years or so. It's a long cycle. I've been wondering what the significance of this is going to be. And frankly, I'm kind of excited. In general, we may be going to hell in a handbasket, but maybe there is some good news to find.

On a Neptunian hunch, I wondered if commercial oil exploitation - in the modern sense - began in the last Neptune cycle. And guess what! It certainly did.

Hermann Melville's wonderful novel Moby-Dick
about the whaling industry, was published in
1851, during the last Neptune transit of Pisces.

On July 31 1853, a Polish chemist (of Armenian descent) called Jan Lukasiewicz, loaned one of the kerosene lamps he'd made to a local hospital. That was the beginning of the modern oil industry and the beginning of the end of commercial whaling, thank goodness. So, you ask, was he Neptune-ruled this Pole?  Yup, born March 8, 1822, pure Pisces.

So if the oil industry started during a Neptune's transit of its own sign, can we hope that it will end with this transit? We all know the writing is on the wall for oil, so I don't feel I'm sticking my neck out by saying, "Yes!" In the same way that whale oil went out of use in the 19th century - slowly, painfully, and as soon as a reasonable substitute was found.

I believe that Father Neptune may provide the next answer too. Matt Simmons, the oil banker who predicted peak oil and the end of the oil industry set up the Ocean Energy Institute a few years ago to exploit the power of the sea. He died last week just when he had the most powerful transits we've seen in years right to his natal Neptune at 0'15" Libra. His death has, of course, brought more attention to the institute. Watch that space!