Fascinated by the stars since the 1st grade, Alexis “Lexi” Haymon, senior, has been writing the horoscopes for The WP Wire since Nov. 7, 2022. The spring and summer editions will be her final Wolverine Horoscopes as she is graduating and heading to college to study international affairs next year.
The horoscopes have been received well in The WP Wire, sometimes garnering the most views of any of the stories in any given month, so there are plenty of students and faculty interested.
While some shrug off the astrological reports as entertainment, Haymon explained how they connect to the stars.
“Astrology is called ‘-ology’ for a reason… it’s nothing empirical… truly rooted in scientific knowledge. It’s rooted in traditional astronomy, traditional associations with planets, planetary movements,” Haymon said.
While some people don’t believe in horoscopes, many see some hope in the stars. “It’s definitely not science. I would never say that. It’s not fully real, because, what it is, it’s theory. It’s not scientifically proven, but there are strong associations, across centuries, millennia. It’s very much rooted in associations,” Haymon said.
Haymon has enjoyed writing for the paper, especially the celebrity of being the author of The Wire’s horoscopes. “I really enjoy being able to write about something that I find interesting, and it makes me very happy that other people find it interesting. [It’s]…something that I can do to give somebody else something fun to read,” she said. “I try to do a paragraph for each one. I don’t want to make it super specific, just something fun, something digestible, nothing cryptic…I want it to be something that you can think of and relate to your own experiences.”
Haymon enjoys teaching the basics of horoscopes to laypeople, sharing information such as “sun signs are based on where the earth is in relation to the sun when you’re born, so it’s can be easily tracked on a calendar.”
The Wire’s staff would like to find a new horoscope writer for next year, though filling her shoes will be difficult. Interested students should stop by room 612 to talk to Ms. Cooper.
As for those who simply don’t like how horoscopes represent their personality, Haymon has some thoughts. “For a long time, some people choose not to believe it [horoscopes] because they’re like, ‘Oh, I don’t like what that sign says about me.’ But I think none of the signs are good or bad; it’s just about what attributes they assign you…I think people are very abrasive to astrology because they just don’t agree with their sun sign, or they don’t understand how it’s calculated, but it’s all very up in the air,” she said.
