Everybody loves a Fifth House Solar Return Sun. For good reason.
Probably the best thing about a Solar Return Sun in the Fifth House is that the Eighth House Solar Return is over. Once more, I’m in transistion in my Eleventh-Eighth-Fifth-Second house pattern, which is known as a suceedent pattern. Now, a few months into my Fifth House year, I’m taking the painful clean slate of last year, with all its lessons about my father and the effects of his influence on me as a child and as a woman in relationships, and I’m moving forward into a new year when I can approach the possibility of romance without all the sludge I’ve been carrying with me my entire life. I’ll have a chance to express myself in this next year and build new outcomes that will help to build a solid financial foundation on those creative expressions when I reach my Second House year. At last, I can see the big picture, especially after two back-to-back cycles of 11-8-5-2–ugh! I can see now, however, how much better a place I’m in and will be in two years from now. Hey, Solar Returns make sense!
What is a Solar Return Chart?
A Solar Return Chart is a special chart for your birthday year based on where you are on the day that the Sun is in the exact place that it was on the day you were born. Though my birthday is March 3rd, my solar return usually takes place on March 2nd. A chart is cast for that day when the Sun matches its position on the day of my birth and it’s like a natal (birth) chart for the entire year-yep, with planets and houses and everything. The thing is, while the planets for that day are in the same conjunctions, oppositions, squares, etc, regardless of where you are in the world, the houses can change-a little bit, at least-if you travel, thereby putting a planet in a more favorable house. Some astrologers believe you can alter your chart for the year by making a birthday trip and others think that your chart reverts back to where you live most of the year and so a trip out of town just isn’t worth it. Most people can’t afford to fly to Europe for a better chart, anyway.
For my Eighth House last year, I was out of luck. I couldn’t travel far enough to escape what had to happen in that year…what needed to happen…to become clear for the future. For my Fifth House, I didn’t want to travel to escape anything. Fifth House is a much more positive, desired Solar Return Year.
It’s not the first for me, this Fifth House Solar Return. I’ve had several before, and if I look at my experiences with Fifth House Solar Return Suns, then I see a pattern form–and astrology is all about patterns.
What Can Happen a Solar Return Sun Is in the Fifth House?
A Fifth House Sun in a Solar Return usually signifies ways of expressing oneself. That expression usually goes in two directions: creativity or romance…or both! It can also represent children or a focus on children, though our children can be the children of our creativity, so it’s a great year for artistic expression, writing, high-producing creativity, music. Sometimes, it represents money but it doesn’t usually manifest that way for me under a Fifth House Sun, and then only as an expression of something else in my life. Here’s how it’s panned out for me over the years.
At age 15:
I can’t say much about romance in my life that year. I was…15. It would be another couple of years before my first boyfriend, so let’s say my romantic side was sort of squelched at that young age. I do remember quite a bit of creative expression. I probably filled a dozen notebooks that year with poetry. Um, romantic poetry.
At age 19:
Big year for me, romance-wise and creativity-wise.
Creativity first. As for the writer in me, I wrote and published a chapbook of what I referred to as a poetry-novel, Nails for My Coffin. (Yeah, I was Goth before it was a thing.) I also wrote quite a few songs, both words and music, which I could play on my guitar and sing. Music and writing were a big part of my life that year. It was also the year I made the first couple of cuts and attended the state competition for the Rhodes Scholarship, scared little thing that I was.
Romance? I casually met a college boy in the Spring, right after I swore off men for six months to make sure I didn’t repeat the mistake I’d just made. Around the first week of September, we were reintroduced and things took off in a big way.
I admit, I enjoy looking back at these patterns now. The influences and patterns are so easy to see in hindsight.
Take a look at my Solar Return chart for that year.
Sun, Venus, and Mars are in my Fifth, Solar Return Venus is conjunct my natal Ascendant, Solar Return Mars is conjunct my natal Venus. Mercury is conjunct my Fifth House cusp, too, and in a broader conjunction to my natal Mercury–life, death, and the Universe discussions are a big attraction factor to me. Solar Return Moon conjunct natal Moon. Solar Return Ascendant in Libra.
Yep, I was primed for falling in love. Blame it on the stars.
This was my first husband, by the way. (I don’t have a second yet, but it feels right to say it that way…scary.)
And then…no Fifth House Suns until 2006, after my divorce:
Creatively, 2006 was a great year for me. In September that year–there’s that September connection, again–my women’s action adventure novel was published by a major publisher. (I’m still trying to get rights back on it, so it can be part of my Secret Lives of Librarians universe.. I indie-published a lot of books that year and was working with about 15 different authors.
My children took center-stage more than usual that year, too. I had ended several key friendships and was largely on my own, so my homelife, being a single mom, making sure the kids were in a good place? All a focus, but with a lot of uncertainty about whether I would remain in my home or consider moving (Solar Return Neptune in my Fourth House, representing my homelife).
Romance? I mostly squelched it that year. I was interested in someone, but he’d moved away and I had no idea what that future held, but I couldn’t summon the interest in anyone new. That interest waned and changed and died as I realized he wasn’t coming back and no one new appealed to me.
There was only so much of me to go around, and my creativity and kids got the most of me.
The romantic interest from the previous year was just a placeholder while I took care of the more grueling aspects of daily life and found my joy in my writing. My dad was in awful health for most of the year, finally dying late in the Solar Return year (Solar Return Chiron conjunct natal Saturn, which has often appeared in my chart as my father). Most of my love (Solar Return Venus in the Third House of Communications) was spent on my mom and on being a mom (conjunct natal Moon). My Solar Return Ascendant was in Scorpio (natal Eighth House of death).
I could have pursued romantic interests that year, but truthfully, I was too burned out and as I answered my friend Maggie Shayne when she suggested I start dating again, “My heart’s just not in it right now.”
Fifth House Sun, 2010:
By 2010, I had one child off at college and another soon to follow. They were taking less of my focus, and I needed to start focusing on ME again.
Creatively, 2010 wasn’t anything particularly special and I didn’t seem to produce as much by the standards I expect of myself. But half-way through the year, I changed how I expressed myself to the world, and started aggressively going after some career goals I’d put on hold (Solar Return Mars conjunct Solar Return Mid-Heaven). I was doing little in the way of creative fiction, but more in regard to non-fiction, even some guides I’ve yet to edit and publish. I know, I know, but I was kind of busy with a little romance.
Romance. Yes. Again.
In the spring of that year, I began talking to a friend who, rather suddenly around the first week of September, became a serious romantic interest.
My Solar Return chart says it all: a stellium (many planets in one sign) in my Fifth House, to include Solar Return Sun conjunct Solar Return Jupiter, Solar Return Venus conjunct Solar Return Uranus (which explains that sudden lightning bolt I kept getting struck by), Part of Fortune, and Solar Return Mercury conjunct natal Ascendant for more of that delicious life, death, and the Universe conversation. I also had Solar Return Juno in the Seventh House conjunct natal Juno, and my Solar Return Ascendant in Libra (partnerships).
Fifth House Sun, 2014:
So…I’m nervous.
I know already, a few months into the year that creativity will play a big part. I’ve got it. I understand the artistic structures I must set in place for my creations to become financially supportive of their mother and that I need to produce and nurture them extra well in the next year to reap the benefits in my Second House Solar Return next year. Less than three months in, I’m feeling a tremendous push.
Romance? There’s definitely a possibility and no one’s more surprised than I am that I’d even think that way. Remarkably–after last year–I am allowing myself to be open to romance.
I’m hoping this is not another 2006…had I not moved on from my last heartbreak, it could possibly have been, with me thinking about a past love instead of taking advantage of the astrological weather to find some new sunshine.
My Solar Return Sun and Solar Return Chiron are conjunct within one degree. There are just too many possible interpretations. It may be a horrific wounding in regard to love or it may be a beautiful healing. It seems to me that the first part of my life, Chiron has been biting my heels and then in the last year or so since my Chiron Return, it’s wiping up the blood and bandaging my flesh as I’m coming to terms with both the wounds and the scars.
My chart also shows Solar Return Neptune conjunct both my natal Ascendant and natal Chiron. If the first few months of this year are any clue, I could certainly see this year as being one of healing and mysticism, especially with Solar Return Jupiter (expansion) in my Ninth House of Knowledge and Spirituality. My Solar Return Ascendant is, once again, in Libra. My Solar Return Venus is conjunct natal Moon. I also like that my Solar Return Fourth House has Venus, for a lovely home or love in the home, so the potential there is nice as well–and Solar Return Mercury conjunct natal Mercury (almost exactly the same as when I was 19) for more wonderful life, death, and the universe discussions in the home, but on the cusp of the Fifth House.
Perhaps I’m past the shock and awe of a Fifth House Sun at 19 or even a few years ago, but I’m not so sure I need a new lover who’ll be a jagged bolt of lightning all year long…might be nice instead to enjoy a bit of warm summer rain. I’ll have to come back at the end of the year and update this page to let you know how it worked out.
Common Patterns
Meanwhile, here’s what I’ve learned by looking at these patterns:
- Just because it’s not a Fifth House Sun Solar Return doesn’t mean romance and creativity can’t find their way into my life. They may not be the main focus or the only focus of the year, but I’ve certainly had some new relationships start with nary a Sun in my Fifth House. The Solar Return chart is simply about focus or themes for the year. Think bigger.
- Watch out for that first week of September! Whatever’s been brewing for me all calendar year boils over then, in a good way.
- I tend to partner up in years with a Solar Return Ascendant in Libra. (I’ll research non Fifth House years to see how this matches up–separate post!)
- Venus in my Fifth House tends to mean a romance but a turbulent one. (I’ll explore this more in a separate post.) Roller coasters, anyone?
- Solar Return Mercury is conjunct either my Ascendant or Mercury in romance-heavy years, which fits, because ease of deep discussions is a big factor in romantic attraction for me.
- Creativity is a mainstay in any Fifth House year. It just can’t not be. Too much of who I am, anyway, but it’s creativity on steroids in Fifth House years.
- Never squelch romance. Never. No matter how busy or how pained by the past. You never know when or if the next chance will come, or if the opportunities will ever be as sweet again.
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