Jupiter is our father
i have a weird relationship with the concept of fatherhood. it’s probably not a good one. i’ve spent most of my life fatherless. today my relationship to my human biological father is a complicated and kind of contrived one. i only found him because i wanted to be a good sister to my little sibling. i make sure i have the power. i’ve had many father figures who are not him, but not a single one was quite right. it was usually emotionally very weak men who my mother was romantically involved with, men who were kind and supportive and deeply flawed. they have stitched me up and decorated my hair with flowers and been watchful over my heart. but then they would be gone to their own world of chaos. that was okay.
this is not to say that motherhood is a perfect and glowing thing to me. my mother is deeply flawed herself, but not close to as ephemeral as a father. like the earth, my mother is just as capable of destruction as she is of creation. our relationship is best as communion.
i have decided that Jupiter is my father. not just my father, but everyone’s father. not the god jupiter, though i think we should probably be worshiping the celestial body as though he is a vengeful, vain god.
our father Jupiter is ancient. he is primordial. when our mother, our home, the Earth was being born, Jupiter was there. problematic age gap! Jupiter is TOXIC. after he arrived, nothing in our solar system was the same. his energy has been creative and destructive at once, like many men. some people call him a failed star. that’s okay. if my experience is any indication, failure is all part of the job. but in failing to be a star, he has given us life. when our mother was young, he furiously flung things at her all the time. he pummeled her.
but our mother the Earth is strong and can not only withstand much abuse, but internalize it, transform it. this to me is part of what feminine energy is, in fact — survival through intractability. immanent transformation. i think this is what makes (western) men afraid of nature, and afraid of women. they long for mastery and control, and, barring that, destruction and domination. but neither the feminine nor Earth will be dominated. both laugh in the face of entitlement to their inner resources. you will see their suffering, but not the internal transformation of this suffering.
like many fathers, Jupiter is also not faithful. this tempestuous relationship with our mother is not the only such relationship our father has. but, he is repentant too. maybe he feels he owns Earth, and that is why he also protects her, and us.
our mother may not survive without his protection. like yin and yang, or some terrible romance, she needs him and always has. if not for his role as bully of the solar system, our mother would be more like him. ironically, his belligerent, dominating presence may be what allowed her to be born small and dynamic and full of potential, instead of a giant orb of gas. it made her solid, it made her strong.
though he gave us life, he can also harm us, or kill us. fathers are not to be relied upon with total trust in my experience. can’t live with em, can’t live without em. Jupiter may have killed the nonavian dinosaurs. why? fit of rage? temperamental bastard. he will probably not do the same to us, since we are killing our mother upon whom we still reside faster than we realized. but he is unpredictable. maybe he will breeze in one night and throw something at us again, something big, something our mother can’t just burn away. maybe it will hit us, and maybe it will hurt us.
our father Jupiter is coming to visit us on monday. i personally will be excited to see him, he whose dominating presence sculpted our young mother for us. i can’t help it. but i will not let my whole heart open for him.
what, spiritually, does his visit mean? i think we, the microbiome of our mother, are too simple to know. we are like children. daddy, daddy! daddy’s home! mom, look, he’s back!
perhaps she is smoking a cigarette, eyes narrowed, feeling his energy of creation, destruction. wondering if he will ever see his children again after this.
Jupiter is my celestial father. unlike my human fathers, he is not weak, and he is not ephemeral. he is not in opposition to Earth; that is a false dichotomy. he is in communion with Earth, as i am in communion with my human mother. Earth is in opposition only to those forces that seek to destroy her, such as extractive capitalist patriarchy. Jupiter is not in opposition to Earth (though he literally is at the moment) because his forces are not purely destructive, like patriarchy. his forces of destruction are not purely negative either, as they have provided the raw material for our mother to become herself.
my characterization of him as a morally neutral, yet semi-abusive father figure likely are tinted with negativity because of my outlook on fathers. i grew up believing it was weak to need protection, weak to not be self-sufficient. our father Jupiter is trying to teach me that it is not weak to need, that protection does not always come with exploitation, and that creation necessitates destruction. let our old mother stay wary. we must trust Jupiter.
