Photo copyright:Â Aislinn Bailey, used with permission.
Well, she looks at you so coolly,
And her eyes shine like the moon in the sea;
She comes in incense and patchouli,
So you take her, to find what waiting inside
The Year of the Cat.
– “The Year of the Cat,” Al Stewart and Peter Wood
Yes, I came in the Year of the Cat. The Water Tiger, to be specific. Maybe that’s why I’m so over-the-top excited about what 2010 has to offer as the Year of the Metal Tiger leaps into action on Valentine’s Day.
Tiger years, once every 12 years on the Chinese astrology calendar, are usually indicative of tiger energies– fierce, bold, full of change, powerful, protective, assertive, unstoppable, spontaneous, exuberant, sometimes a little too brash–but mixed with the element of metal, this 2010 Year of the Metal Tiger could bring a bit of sharpness.
Overall, I expect it to be a terrific year
for tigers, even with lots of upheaval and change. I think the key will be to stay flexible and expect that there will be great change on both a world and personal level.
Based on history–looking at past Metal Tiger years, there’s been a lot of turbulence in the world at those times, including wars starting and social change. If I were to predict what I think 2010 will bring us, I would guess that there’ll be some unfounded optimism, quick adjustments to be made, economic drama, and military conflicts that escalate with some surprises. Keep an eye, for example, on the tie to social upheaval, economic shifts, and political restlessness reflected in the US as the US presence builds in Afghanistan. Disasters are more likely to be of fire and earth categories, such as fires, volcanoes, earthquakes, explosions, and nuclear/radiological. As a matter of fact, watch for all sorts of unusual breakthroughs and break-a-parts related to energy, particularly the atomic/nuclear/radiological type.
Just for fun, here are a few things that happened in previous Metal Tiger years:
1950: Start of the war in Korea, invasion of Tibet, Atomic Energy Commission began hydrogen bomb, huge focus on communism, McCarthy Era paranoia.
1890: Significant year for shipwrecks, Wounded Knee Massacre, first electric chair execution, first geothermal well, US Census uses punch cards.
1830: France invaded Algeria, Belgian Revolution, November Uprising (Poland), Indian Removal Act in US, Church of Latter Day Saints started as Church of Christ, first intercity passenger railway operated by steam
1770: Boston Massacre (trigger event for American Revolutionary War), closest approach by comet (Lexall’s) in history, Russo-Turkish War, Falkland Crisis, royal wedding fireworks disaster
Interesting and eerie…. I actually went as far back as the turn of the first millennium and realized that all the bloody battles between countries that I had prepared to list here had no meaning for me–or very little, when I could remember their history. They were just wars and conflicts lost to the centuries. It made me wonder if, in a few more centuries, the US involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Korean War, the hydrogen bomb, etc, will simply be another meaningless footnote in the history of Metal Tiger years.
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