“Houses?” Anjie bites into a buffalo wing.
“Yep! For example, romantic and professional relationships are ruled by the seventh house. My seventh house is in Capricorn, which is ruled by Saturn.” I pause. Are they still engaged? Anjie and I make eye contact, and she nods along.
“Still listening, keep going,” Sewa says, the sound of the nail buffer filling the space.
“Saturn rules over longevity, time, aging, rigidity—”
“That really is you.” Sewa’s head pops up, and she shoots me a cheeky grin.
“Don’t be rude.” I kick her playfully. “But it makes sense. It has taken me a long time to find someone. And Cole is a year older, so it all tracks with Saturn.” I shrug.
“That was so insight—” Anjie begins, but I cut her off.
“There’s one more thing. It’s called a Saturn return, where Saturn wrecks your life, breaks you down, and makes you reassess all your habits and responsibilities. You’re literally forced to reconsider everything and become a new person.”
“So, it’s a coming-of-age period?” Sewa asks.
“But for adults.”
Anjie’s eyebrows scrunch. “Does this happen to be around thirty? Cause that was a bitch. It was when I was trying to secure the restaurant a new building.”
“I was contemplating leaving my job and returning to school,” Sewa says.
“And I got back into dating,” I say, following their leads. “That’s the Saturn return for you. New changes that influence the rest of adulthood.”
After college, I wasn’t thinking about love. However, once I turned thirty, even though I had a steady job in the U.S. and best friends a girl would kill for, it felt like something was missing. Call it a Saturn return or simply aging, but I owed it to myself to stop letting a failed college relationship hold me back.
“That was deep.” Anjie holds a spring roll to my mouth. Sewa nudges her, and she cuts off a piece and plops it into her mouth too.
“What about the signs?” Sewa asks. “Virgo, Aries, those things.”
“Okay, so aside from the houses, the signs play a role, but the houses influence them,” I try to explain, pinching at the air with my free hand. “Think of it this way. There’s a house, and it has amenities. The astrological signs live in this house, but depending on the conditions, it could go sideways. In my case, Saturn controls my relationships. But I’m a Cancer Venus, which also deals with my dating life. Cancer is protective, soft. And Saturn is—”
“Rigid,” Anjie says, resting her cheek on her palm.
“So, when a soft babe is in a hard house?”
“She has to develop tough skin,” Sewa responds, pressing a nail into the glue on my left index finger.
“But…” I trail off, pointing at Anjie like a conductor directing her symphony.
“She’s still a soft babe on the inside despite the outer shell. Like a crab. That’s Cancer. Right?”
“Precisely!” I exclaim.
“Wow. I recommended the app to you, but your knowledge has surpassed mine,” Anjie says.
“No vex.” I blow her a kiss for putting the app on my radar.
Initially, I was skeptical because a dating app with a 99 percent success rate sounds like a scam, but after I read reviews and watched videos about people’s positive experiences, I was sold.
“So, how does your man Cole fit into all of this? Is he a Capricorn…?” Anjie snaps her fingers. “Oh, you know what I mean.”
Her frustration makes me giggle. “He’s not a Capricorn Venus, but it doesn’t have to be one-to-one like that. He’s business-oriented, stable, direct, and a huge gift giver. Very Capricorn. So, we’re good,” I explain.
“Oh, it’s giving me a headache. I’ll be back.” Anjie rubs her temples. She gets up from the couch and heads to the kitchen.
“I wonder how theCupid’s Bowpeople do it since they claim not to use an algorithm.” Sewa’s accusatory tone doesn’t escape me. I’ve also wondered, but since I found love with Cole so quickly, I don’t care what they do. It’s magic. And who am I to question magic?
