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Living in the Moment, It's Never Over

I have this bad habit during basketball games. Mostly when a team I like is playing in a close game. The streaming service era of sports has us all watching different feeds. Slightly ahead and slightly behind. (The stream-and-subscription-ification will end us. Media and sports should be more accessible to watch not less! For all this talk of ratings they never talk about this. Anyways.)

My bad habit. I will be in a server where the stream is slightly ahead of mine or I will tell myself I am checking the box score on an app even though their play-by-play is guaranteed to be ahead of my stream, and it's because I need to know. I need to know what's coming next. Who is up now? Who scored to make that happen? Are we still gonna win? I want the information as soon as possible. It's a team I love. A team whose winning sparks joy and losing sparks anguish. It's so fun to pull for a team in a game where the stakes are Ws and Ls, trophies or not, bragging rights to friends (and enemies). When games are just games! And still I care so much that I feel like I can't wait to watch what happens. I feel like I need to know what's coming.

But it is in this needing to know that I am losing some of the magic, some of the joy that comes even in losses. When the Pacers came back against the Knicks at the Garden down 17 in the 4th, I had turned that game off completely. I do not like the Knicks and watching them win does not bring me joy. I felt so sure they would win. But as every team that's faced the Pacers in the playoffs this year knows, it's never over. I should have kept watching that game. I did manage to turn it back on and watch the last minute and OT thanks to the box score checking and the servers. One win for technology. Then when it was over I went back and watched the whole comeback from when I turned the game off. I'm obsessed with basketball so there is still joy in watching a game knowing where it is going too. But witnessing that comeback would have hit different if I had just kept watching.

I have been more and more cognizant of this bad habit lately. Reading the plays before I watch them, finding the information before I see it happen, taking that control so I don't have to sit in the unknown and just see what happens next. That's the excitement and joy of going to a game in person. One could even argue it's the whole damn point. "This is why we play the game" or whatever. I want to bring that excitement and joy home.

So as we go into Game 4 of the Finals, I wanna be more present to the game that I love so much and has shaped so much of my life. Watching to see what happens and living in the moment of watching a game not knowing where it's going. I won't justify that it's just a minute or a couple plays ahead like that is insignificant in basketball. I want to see it happen first. Even if it hurts.

I also want to take what I've learned from the Pacers. . . it's never over! Go Thunder.

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Never underestimate the ability of a basketball game to break your heart.

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Shai Gilgeous-Alexander wins the 2025 Western Conference Finals MVP award

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silly

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Only gotta win 4 more games and they are Champions :')

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Saturn is in Aries

It's been there since May 24. Where I am it has been raining and will be raining for a few more days. Almost as if Pisces is reminding us of Saturn's return via retrograde on September 1.

As I have reflected on my own Saturn Return in Pisces, it has always struck me how collective this transit has felt. Saturn is both an individual and collective planet to me. Yet somehow this particular transit has felt like everyone is having a Return. Perhaps we are. Saturn is finishing its cycle through the Zodiac. Giving us lessons in this 12th House realm ready to show us what it will take to birth a new world that does not accept the atrocities of today. And what Saturn in Aries, a very individual placement in the Zodiac's 1st House, is showing us is that it will take our individual efforts.

The group does not exist without the individual and the individual does not exist without the group. We need each other. We need to be true to ourselves. Saturn in Aries will be asking us to develop our boundaries of self. What am I okay with? What am I absolutely not okay with? Who will I be? Who will I be to my community? Who will I be to my self? Am I satisfied with the version of myself that I have been? What am I willing to change? Saturn wants us to answer these questions with clarity and wisdom. Aries wants us to be confident.

We only have a brief stint here until September 1 before Saturn re-enters Pisces until February. That re-entrance is a huge theme of 2025 and 2026 as we have had multiple planets oscillating this Pisces/Aries cusp via retrogrades. Venus, Mercury, Neptune, and Saturn. The North Node has also been sitting in Pisces. If it feels like a new era is aching to be born, you are not alone in that feeling.

When defining ourselves or determining what we want as individuals we must not forget that we belong to the group, the collective, the world. I am a member of the community. You are a member of the community. If we are not true to ourselves we cannot be true to those around us. Saturn in Aries is here to teach us how to be our own person without abandoning each other. We must be willing to learn.

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Conference Finals Baby

In my opinion, it's so refreshing to be in this new era of the league. I enjoy seeing these teams at this stage of the playoffs (minus the Knicks, I hate NY). But I am excited to see Conference Finals versions of Hali, Bruson, Shai, and Rudy Gobert (LOL obviously joking).

The OKC Thunder are still the favorites but the Knicks ability to pull this off looks more and more possible the further they go. Knicks in 7. Thunder in 6.

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i would like to interview people and be interviewed

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Shrink the Game?

We don't need more eyes on women's basketball and the WNBA when those eyes come with disingenuous motives or simply capitalize on a trend.

Also, the increased right wing interest in women's sports happening with the new height of transmisogyny we live with is not a coincidence. "Protect women's sports" but they don't actually give a damn about all the women already playing these sports.

We are like 2 games into the regular season and I am already tired...

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Saturn in Pisces Questions to Reflect on in a Longer Post at a Later Date

What are we being asked to let die knowing something better will be born?

The planet of boundaries, stopping, slowing down, pausing, restrictions in the sign of the boundless ocean. How do we put boundaries on the sea? Waves and currents rushing and tumbling over erected walls. Even the shore can be washed away.

Saturn in Pisces feels exceptionally collective, as it is the last sign of the Zodiac. Saturn is beginning its journey again. How do we collectively mourn this chapter ending so that we can embrace the joy and fun that is available to us through the pain and on the other side?

What is the Pisces/Aries cusp of 2025-2026 making available to us if we take the time to notice?

Our selflessness must have a limit. We cannot endlessly give. We cannot only receive. What has Saturn in Pisces shown us about reciprocity and mutual aid?

When Saturn returns to Pisces on September 1, what lessons will it be asking us to revisit and make sure that we learned?

A new world is begging to be born and we are capable of guiding that world into existence with our very own hands. But, it takes all of us.

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Tarot Readings by the River.