The Moon at the Crossroads (detail from the illustration for Crossroads Hotel) Mo 2013
last week Liz Ackert was wondering whether the left facing crescent moon is waxing or waning here in the Land Down Under to which I blithely replied that the view of the ever changing moon is the same wherever we are on the planet but I was wrong!
It’s a waning moon down here and a waxing moon up there
Here’s some good links that are helping me understand the why of it…
Does the moon look different in the Northern & Southern hemispheres?
Does the Moon look the same in different countries?
Lunar phase
my excuse for living in a state of eternal confusion is that I am left handed and was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in the USA but have lived here in Australia since 1969 so I am always wondering which way a tap turns on or off, which way a cyclone spins & spent years inverting the American Indian Medicine Wheel until I oriented South to where my feet touch the earth, North to where my head touches the sky, East is where the sun rises and west is where it sets no matter where I am standing on our planet…
dedication page for An illuminated Book of Cats 2010
and a favourite poem
THE CAT AND THE MOON
The cat went here and there
And the moon spun round like a top,
And the nearest kin of the moon,
The creeping cat, looked up.
Black Minnaloushe stared at the moon,
For, wander and wail as he would,
The pure cold light in the sky
Troubled his animal blood.
Minnaloushe runs in the grass
Lifting his delicate feet.
Do you dance, Minnaloushe, do you dance?
When two close kindred meet,
What better than call a dance?
Maybe the moon may learn,
Tired of that courtly fashion,
A new dance turn.
Minnaloushe creeps through the grass
From moonlit place to place,
The sacred moon overhead
Has taken a new phase.
Does Minnaloushe know that his pupils
Will pass from change to change,
And that from round to crescent,
From crescent to round they range?
Minnaloushe creeps through the grass
Alone, important and wise,
And lifts to the changing moon
His changing eyes.
— William Butler Yeats
It's Crow Time 
hahaha! At least you retained your leftiness; I became right-dominant by about 7 years old. It’s a right-handed world.My mother was the same, but at least she taught me to read knitting patterns -imagine wasting great swathes of time transcribing for the left hand!
Great links, too.
oh knitting you will laugh at my one attempt… trying to invert the pattern so I could understand it, then worked the size 12 vest pattern so tightly that I had to use a nail to prise up the wool to get the needle under for each stitch… the vest was so thick and tiny it would have been good for a six year old in a very cold climate & and in attempting to play a right handed guitar I am very good at making the chords with my left hand but hopeless at finding the rhythm… so I leave music making to those who can!!
I’m not much of a knitter and my efforts to teach my left handed grand daughter were hopeless. She has struggled on without me and has worked it out for herself. She learns guitar at school and seems to have no problems. Love your moon.
even after 60 years I still feel like a “Stranger in a Strange Land” trying to “grok” this place!
even after more then 60 years i leave knitting to those who can but……i can paint 2handed………
are you more left or right handed Martine?
I’m righthanded but i can work with 2 hands simultaniously……..if i dont have to think….
And I am in Arkansas … laughing with delight. Because of course I could have looked it up, but it was ever so much more fun to ask my favorite friend from the other side of the world. Thank you Mo! Now I’m going to go see which way the waxing crescent is pointing tonight.
it’s been a week of questioning what I think I know!
the links were very interesting…thanks for posting……Never having been to the Northern Hemisphere I had no idea it was seen differently. I will know what to expect to see when I do.
I just can’t believe in all the trips to the US and back again visiting family over the past 45 years that I never noticed the difference!
I am dizzy just from reading your list of topsy-turvy, maybe because mom made me go right? Passing the poem onto a sister cat lover.
you were left handed too!
yes, but almost all gone now. probably wouldn’t have needed so much therapy if she’d left me alone (in all kinds of ways-ha!)
(((Cindy)))
I am left handed it does make for a confusing world. My Gran tried to teach me knitting and crochet and failed dismally but I did work it out later but still don’t do it.
Do you go round art exhibitions the other way to everybody else? I do, and the underground is a nightmare, I can never get through the barriers as I always have my ticket in the wrong hand.
I prefer going round exhibitions widdershins & put cards in the wrong way ’round too!
Meant to say, love the image.
Thanks for all the interesting links Mo !
Love the “Horus” eye on your moon
The Egyptian influence in my work began with seeing The Tenant by Roman Polanski back in 1976 and then studying how to read and write hieroglyphs in 1998 & how we humans have been reinventing the meaning and myths in our use of symbols for millennia
I must admit that I’m quite shocked to find that waxing and waning are opposite in the two hemispheres! If someone had asked me, I would have replied the same as you did. And what if you are right on the equator? I’m going to have to read those links to figure this out…
Love that Yeats poem!
it’s been a week of reassessing what I think I know which is always a good reality check!