Long before I became interested in the news, my favourite bit of the newspaper was always the horoscope section.
My Dad would often come home from work with a copy of The Sun, and I’d flick past the politics and tabloid gossip until I reached Mystic Meg’s astrology column, anticipating my fate as told through the crystal ball that accompanied her iconic image, complete with jet black hair and a piercing gaze.
Mystic Meg, real name Margaret Lake, sadly passed away at age 80 this week after being taken to the hospital with the flu. Having risen to fame on the National Lottery, she went on to write astrology columns for The Sun and The News of the World, and has since cemented her legacy as Britain’s most well-known astrologist.
I didn’t know a great deal about astrology back then, past that I was born on 1 March, and was therefore a Pisces, which apparently meant I had an innate set of characteristics and traits such as being sensitive and a hopeless romantic (guilty).
Writing her horoscopes in a traditional style of certainties (i.e. this will happen to you or you will meet someone), Meg would often predict I would get a text, or a knock at the door on a certain day at a very specific time, and although they never came true, there was something enticing about the prospect that someone could know what your future holds better than you.
Mystic Meg ignited my love of astrology, and she was loved by many others. Her prominence was magnified in a world that was only just getting used to the internet, and her visibility meant she quickly became a fixture of British culture. Her longtime agent Dave Shapland told The Sun: “She even became part of the English language – if a politician, somebody from showbiz or ordinary people in the street are asked a tricky question they will say ‘Who do you think I am, Mystic Meg?’”
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Her column inspired me to write the horoscope section of my primary school newspaper, and I took great pride in being the one to determine the fortunes of everyone in my school, even though my predications had no basis in anything apart from my own imagination. As a nine-year old I would use it to my own advantage, subtly telling girls I had fallen out with that I didn’t like them anymore or hinting to a boy who happened to be a Cancer that I fancied him.
Back in the early 2000s, astrology was still seen as “girly” and twee, something resigned to the back pages of a women’s magazine. Decades later, astrology has exploded into the mainstream. Instagram is littered with everything from professional astrologists like Nadine Jane (@nadinejane_astrology)and Chani Nicholas (@chaninicholas) to meme pages dedicated to specific star signs. Some of the most popular astrologers have hundreds of thousands, or even millions of followers. TikTok videos of tarot readings have amassed almost 17 billion views and videos with the hashtag “astrology” totalling nearly 54 billion.
As I’ve gotten older, my passion for astrology has only deepened. I’m a proud Pisces and will likely bang on about it for ages if you let me. I’ve even recently got a tattoo to prove it. I will happily draw up your birth chart for you and tell you if Venus is in Capricorn or Taurus (right now, it’s in Aries until 16 March). I’m also a novice tarot card reader and do readings for my friends and family when we get together, and we always have a good laugh.
Astrology might not be scientific or factual, but there’s actually a lot of beauty in that. In a world that is so obsessed with fact-checking and arguing about is considered to be “the truth”, I’ve found great comfort in the nuances of astrology. There are no absolutes, just interpretations of things that you can utilise or discard however you see fit.
So I’m thrilled more and more people are getting into astrology. While it would be silly to confine yourself to certain attributes like being outgoing or timid based on your star sign, astrology does encourage you to self-reflect and self-analyse, two things that are crucial for building character.
Underneath all the “I’m a Pisces sun and Virgo rising” (which I am, in case you were interested), you will find a community of people who have a shared interest in learning more about themselves and are always looking to constantly evolve and improve on what is possible, and most importantly, having a little fun! And, in a big way, we’ve got Mystic Meg to thank for that.