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| ARIES Man - VIRGO Woman |
"Oh, say you're pleased," cried Nibs
He was a lovely boy, clad in skeleton leaves and the juices
that ooze out of trees; but the most entrancing thing about
him was that he had all his first teeth. When he saw that
she was a grown-up, he gnashed the little pearls at her.
It's sad, but often true. An Aries man will at some time in his relationship with a Virgo woman feel the need to prove to her that his ideas and ideals are sensible, that he is emotionally mature - and in general, he will try to arouse her enthusiasm for his plans, his ambitions, and his feelings.
It's not that she isn't pleased, but her response, if she's a typical Virgin, may leave him with a vague sense that she somehow disapproves of what he's been trying to tell her. She probably does. She may wholeheartedly support most of what he's projecting and imagining, but there will nearly always be some small portion of his narrative she feels is off-center, or not well enough thought out and constructed. Virgos are like that. They spot the weak links in the chain and warn you about them before the chain breaks. We all really ought to be grateful to them for this neat habit they have of pointing out flaws before it's too late, so the bottom line and the end result of every venture will be more perfectly successful. Most people are properly grateful for Virgo's ability to bring calm order out of chaotic disorder. Not the Ram. He'll fiercely resent her lack of total commitment to his causes, his emotions, his outrages, his dreams, and his superiority. After a time, he may angrily accuse her of having no sensitivity and no imagination.
He's very wrong. This girl possesses a lovely, sensitive imagination. Other children may eat "Chicken and Stars" soup for years without a single comment, but when she was a little girl, she would always delightedly exclaim (quietly, shyly, to herself, when no one could hear) "Oh, just see the little stars floating in my soup!" When someone gave her ginger ale in a cut-glass goblet one morning, and it caught the sunlight, she cried out (within) "Oh, how perfectly marvelous! I have a rainbow in my ginger bubbles!"
Just because she whispered these marvels only to her secret make-believe best friend - and seldom or never exclaimed them aloud, she grew up with everyone around her thinking she was terribly prosaic and unimaginative - because she didn't flaunt her brilliant mind and private thoughts. Then he came along, the handsome, dashing Ram, to make her feel she was a very special person. It warmed her cool Virgin heart, and made her more sure of herself than she had ever been before. Now here he is, like all the others, accusing her of having no imagination. Insensitive? Perhaps he's the one who's insensitive.
This woman's inner world may not be peopled with imaginary faerie creatures every single moment of the day. Nevertheless, it's a beautiful land of wonder, because she sees loveliness in the small and ordinary things. Once the Aries man who cherishes her truly comprehends this - stops yelling at her and putting her down - he can persuade her to open the locked trunk of her wistful yearnings and secret fancies and expose them to the warm sunbeams of loving affection - encourage her to bring her fears out into the fresh air, instead of holding hurt inside, where it may grow into migraine headaches and all manner of aches and pains and physical ills. Yes, she will learn much of value from him.
He can learn a lot from her too. Like thoughtful consideration for others the peace and happiness of serving (instead of being served). This she demonstrates nearly every day they're together. Yet he seldom notices. He doesn't see her gentle smile when he silently wishes for a magic elf to help him with something he's doing physically or some problem he's pondering mentally. She glides into the confusion so softly, he's hardly aware of her presence and helps to make things come out right, even without being asked. Also without expecting to be praised. She would glow under his gratitude, but she won't demand it of him. She's only doing what comes naturally to Virgo when she's helping, so praise is not her aim, since ego and self-aggrandizement are not her motives. Still, it wouldn't hurt him to notice - and perhaps say "thank you, darling" now and then. He might even say "thank you for loving me"... because the pure love of a Virgo woman is a priceless gift, never given casually.
A Virgo woman is so nice to come home to when she likes herself, is being herself - and allowing the Ram she loves to be himself. If she's a typical Virgin, she's unobtrusive (unobtrusive compared to Aries!), yet bright and pleasant, a joy to be around. She's quiet and courteous and she needs lots of affection (for which she'll never ask, any more than she asks for gratitude). She's sometimes critical, yes, but ordinarily she's at least polite while she's hair-splitting and nitpicking.
The Aries man who loves this intelligent feminine creature might comfort her when she's blue and discouraged over some small mistake she's made (Virgos tend strongly toward self-chastisement) by reminding her that even the gentle Nazarene momentarily made the mistake of losing his wonted "perfect" control when he lashed the money changers in the temple. Then too, there are the "lost years," during which the humble carpenter isn't mentioned in the scriptures (quite a number of them, as a matter of fact). The Ram might tell his worried Virgo lady it's probably that, during those "lost years," Jesus more than once nailed the wrong boards together in the carpentry shop of his father, Joseph miscalculated his taxes, which were due to be paid to Caesar's Internal Revenue (or didn't make it to Bethlehem in time to pay them on the deadline date), ripped his robe on a sharp rock stubbed his toe ... was briefly cranky with Mary Magdalene .... and committed who knows how many other miscellaneous minor goofs? Thanks to the uptight censors of the scriptures, no one does. But one can make a spiritually educated guess. And who is she, the Ram can then ask her, to aspire to a more flawless record of human behavior than that of such a simple, humble man as Jesus of Nazareth?
It may help to enlighten the Virgo woman to how unnecessary most of her worries about her failures really are. And help her to see that perfection is not the requirement for self-acceptance she so often believes it to be.
There's frequently a misty enchantment inherent in the physical love between the Aries man and the Virgo woman. These two are rather likely to be among the few people still left who are still sexually unpolluted by the explicit sex being flaunted in everyone's faces, whether they like it or not. The Ram is a confirmed idealist (and a super-jealous one besides), whereas the female Virgin is normally turned off by sexual or any other kind of vulgarity and cheapness. She also would prefer him not to leave the catsup bottle on the dining-room table. Discrimination flashes its sparkles into many facets of human existence, from sex to catsup bottles to messy closets and untidy drawers - not to mention sloppy thinking and a dull intellect. Her own thinking is never sloppy, her own intellect never dull.
Their lovemaking will reflect their mutual idealism and subconscious search for purity and innocence. This doesn't mean the physical aspect of love between them will lack passion. The male Ram, ruled as he is by Mars, is passion personified. Yet, he's also touchingly affectionate, usually mindful of the small things related to sexual unity - and she will respond to this quality in him with genuine joy. But she must be careful not to criticize his romantic techniques or allow her innate coolness of approach to make ashes of the flaming sort of sexual expression he offers her so trustingly. Conversely, he must be careful not to offend her sense of delicacy by always making sure that tenderness and gentleness are a part of their union. It would also help if he didn't pout or feel so wounded those times when she'd rather demonstrate her love for him in ways other than physical. The vitality of his sexual stamina may often exceed hers - and when it does, he should remind himself that patience is a virtue which brings its own reward - in addition to the reward of her return to being a warm, loving woman.
He must simply give her time to rest awhile and refresh her desires. Also, he should know that her enthusiasm for making love will always be somewhat diluted in direct ratio to the vexing worries and problems she's encountered throughout the hours preceding his need that she surrender herself to him. Even at best, Virgos never surrender their whole selves to love. Aries men do. And this is a basic difference between them which will need to be handled with care.
Despite their natural affinity in matters romantic, these two could allow their romance to gradually take the form of a less emotionally demanding mutual mental respect. There's certainly nothing wrong with mutual mental respect, but it needs a few more brilliant facets to set it off - like mutual emotional involvement and vibrancy. Still, rarely is even a romantically frustrated Virgo or Arian unfaithful. Not without monumental cause. It's equally rare, if they're typical of their Sun Signs, for either to leave or desert the other, even under extreme provocation - once they've committed themselves to devotion. For to Virgo, devotion is first analyzed, then defined as more responsibility than sentiment. Consequently, when a Virgo decides to desert such a "responsibility," you can be sure the decision to "cut out" was motivated by personal injury of such immeasurable depth it decreed either a final solution of escape or actual mental breakdown. Virgos have little or no immunity to long-continued mental and emotional pressures.
The Aries man is reluctant to admit he's been wrong about a relationship for the exact opposite reason than that of Virgo. He keeps trying, not because of "responsibility," as she does, but because of "sentiment." It's difficult for the Ram to imagine he could have been mistaken about love, once he's believed in it with all his heart. This man puts all of himself into every venture, dedicates himself with fiery intent to every challenge - and love is no different from the rest. Could Romeo ever stop loving Juliet, or Juliet ever grow tired of Romeo? Of course not. That's more or less the way he sees it. He forgets that both these medieval lovers died before they were twenty, and had they lived, they would probably have experienced their share of misunderstandings and disagreements, being only human. Strangely, he's as much a perfectionist about love as his Virgo woman is about everything but love.
It's as though she expected love to have flaws, therefore isn't terribly surprised when the flaws appear. It's only the other areas of life where she's repeatedly disillusioned to find things less than flawless. With him it's just the opposite. Life's major disappointments he can shrug off, but of "love" he demands perfection. Somewhere in between their oddly transposed views, these two should be able to find a basis for understanding each other.
When serious trouble arises in this relationship, the tie is usually severed by the slashing scissors of unbearable outside pressures of one kind or another, not by a decline of their love. Sometimes it's her near fanatical obsession with the obligations of a career or her duties in the home. Sometimes it's his fierce ambition and single-minded purpose that causes him to place her last - after his great goal in life - his crusade for self-identification. Then she may feel an irresistible compulsion to interfere by criticizing his attitudes - either privately or publicly. This first frustrates, then humiliates, and finally angers him into a Mars-like rage of resentment, which in turn freezes her desire to help him into icy detachment and an almost smug satisfaction at his misery. Then something will have to give - fast! Otherwise, their mutual need for reciprocated affection from each other will soon become secondary to their mutual need for self-respect - and they'll part, each to seek alone the peace of mind they couldn't find together.
That's the dark side. The bright side is that this man and woman can mend the silver cord that links them together each time it breaks - with the magical healing power of love. But only when he defines love as unselfishness and an awareness of her needs - only when she defines love as spontaneous trust and enthusiasm for his dreams. Once these two get their definitions straight, their love can last and the tiny cracks they mended with mutual consideration won't even show. Unless the Virgin keeps inspecting it with a magnifying glass - or the Ram impulsively, carelessly shatters it again. Love is like a precious work of art, fragile and delicate ... much lovelier and far more valuable when it's weathered the years.
