How to Be a True Piscean

First, you must qualify. You’re born no earlier than February 19 and no later than March 20. In your case, it’s March 4 which in a leap year puts you smack in the middle. You’re in great company with plenty of famous fish who’ve made their mark in the proverbial pond. There’s George Washington and Michelangelo. Sidney Poitier and Elizabeth Taylor. Nat “King” Cole and Jon Bon Jovi. Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs. Fine, Justin Bieber too.

Next, you ponder over the Pisces-themed mug you caffeinate out of each day. You can’t recall whether it was a present or something you gifted to yourself. On one side are two fish, in a yin and yang dance, and on the other, a synopsis of character traits, serving as a ready reference to the astrological essence against which you audit yourself.

You have a sensitive nature and make a compassionate friend. Bingo! You’re at the mercy of every Hollywood movie manipulation, your tear ducts quick to turn on like barrel spigots as love is lost and triumph trumps. Think Forrest Gump. Titanic. Schindler’s List. True, no one is immune. But with you, it’s a next level of emotional mess.

You choose to focus on the good in others and are quick to give one the benefit of the doubt. Genuinely liked for your geniality, ever willing to lend an ear even if you end up with an earful. You delight others with unexpected gifts (that trip to Tunisia) or grand gestures (flying back from Bangkok to New York a week later as a birthday surprise). On occasion a recipient is taken aback (that blind date and the dozen red roses sprayed with Baby’s Breath), giving you the side-eye. Though your motives are pure and unflinching.

You are ruled by your emotions and your great imagination. No kidding. You lead with your heart which can cause headaches. You are quick to a laugh. And while it takes a lot for you to turn apoplectic, when you do so the earth shakes and aftershocks linger. Remember when the gang said they weren’t meeting up for drinks and dinner and you unwittingly caught them red-handed? Excluding you on purpose? The deceit. The hypocrisy. The hurt that still scars. Forgive and forget? Nah, they’re dead to you.

You choose not to be defined by your job alone though you’re damned good at it. Ambitious, a go-getter, a creative creature who can conceptualize and strategize as much as he can execute and cross items off a TO DO list like nobody’s business. You love to blue sky, that’s why you’re a staple at brainstorming sessions. You’re a rainmaker too. And why you are worth having around.

Writing is your religion. And wandering, your meditation. You give credence to the belief that we would treat others better if everyone had a passport and the means to travel far and wide.

You are an incurable romantic who loves to be in love, intuitively understanding your partner’s needs. To a fault. How about love is the oxygen that enables you to submerge into its deepest ends? You sure fall fast and hard. It’s high-stakes or go home. Like with G. when he paid you some attention. In retrospect, you may have come across too strong with the all-expense-paid getaway at that overpriced B&B in the Jersey countryside. He was thinking something more casual to begin with. Three weeks in and it was bitter breakup over what never broke in to begin with.

And what about C.? You force fed him to your circle of friends who’d be guests at your imagined wedding in six months, bagpipes and all, already drafting your announcement for Vows in the Sunday Styles section of The New York Times. You chose not to see the signs, the handful of hints he dropped on your walks in the forest. That this was just a rebound. An extended roll in the hay. And that you might be better off just friends. You give him the space he needs. But when someone says “good-bye,” and is back in Milwaukee, well, it’s high-time you listened to your therapist.

But to pull out all the romantic stops, from the schmaltzy serenades to candlelight courting, to make a deep connection and even be a Romeo in the sack that makes them coming back for more. That’s what it’s all about, right? Never mind how hard the fall.

You sometimes let others take advantage of your generosity. Freaky, right? Like when M. cajoled you into lending him a thousand dollars to get through a pinch even though you knew the moment you triggered the wire transfer that it was as good as sunk. Or when J. begged for a Hoverboard. Never mind the news of battery fires and that he was turning north of fifty. You thought you had held your ground offering money instead to put food on the table until he posted his smooth moves on Instagram.

You need to think thrice whenever a Nigerian prince or U.S. pilot based at Bagram Airfield comes an e-knocking with flattery on a dating site. Their tales of woe followed by a sly pivot for a request that you send over an iTunes card.

But your vision of the world as it should be is a shining example to others. HA! You’re the beauty pageant contestant that wants world peace. Your platform is this fragile earth to be saved before it’s too late. While trite it’s true. That the change we seek starts from within. You who are able to get out of bed and greet each day with purpose, to pursue a dream, well, thank your lucky stars. You already have in your hands a winning lottery ticket in life.

You cherish customs and traditions near and far. You do more than give diversity and inclusivity lip service. You are fervent about social justice, finally getting why Black Lives Matter and joining in your hometown’s protest. It was Horace Mann who said that “education is the great equalizer of the conditions of man.” That’s why you work for a non-profit, on a mission, doing your part to bring quality and equity into the classroom, making that vision a reality.

You want to leave this world a better place.

You get that some may be on the cusp, and that Jupiter, Venus or any other planet rising can wreak havoc in one’s cosmos. We are seven, eight billion magnificent beings, each a special soul sharing one lonely planet. How does the Coldplay song go? A sky full of stars? And what does the Moby song say? We are all made of stars?

But you, yes you, are as fishy as they come.