I have heard it said among those who are interested in the phenomenon of synchronicities that traveling can heighten the frequency and intensity of them. In my experience? Yes, and yes. And with this latest trip, it started with leaving (unintentionally) as the clock struck 11:11am on 1-11-2024.

I had been intending to leave Zoom Town for over a month, but kept finding reasons to stay. It took the descending arrival of the polar vortex to finally push me into departure–so, after some haggling over a blade trade at the Pawn Shop I had just written about in a post about 3 dead bodies, I finally left the Walmart parking lot at the spooky hour of twin elevens on the eleventh day of January.

There is an unwritten part of that post about dead bodies that I’ll keep publicly unwritten, for now, but I’ll hint at who that unwritten part entails with the first instance of WATCH OUT, MR. JOURNALIST that I experienced on my trip, and it happened at a gas station in the Bitterroot valley.

As the creator and sole-member (so far) of the Detective Guy Baker fan club, I take it upon myself to archive stories about this semi-famous cop who has been a character in a book by Jon Krakauer, and the prime media-handler in a podcast on the disappearance of Jermain Charlo. With that context in mind, I asked the gas station attendant if he had any stories about Detective Baker for me, not really thinking I’d get one. But I did.

“Yeah,” said the attendant, “I called Baker about trafficked Indigenous women, but he hasn’t called me back yet.” 

I was surprised–and not just because this country-bumpkin looking dude used the word “Indigenous” instead of “Indian” when describing his concern–but because my method of using echo-location, like a bat, to uncover Detective Baker stories had something like a 80% positive return. For example, on New Year’s Eve, I was describing my methodology to a source, so I asked a random girl walking with her friend on the sidewalk if she knew Detective Baker and had any stories for me. 

Her response? Yeah, she did know Detective Baker, because she briefly dated his son, but NO, no stories like the ones I told her about. After she walked off the person I was talking to questioned the veracity of her quick and emphatic NO.

After the gas station I made a stop at a little book store in Darby. When I told the woman about the nature of my travels, and the core synchronicity that started it all for me, the chills she got caused her to take a step back from me. I know, because she told me that was the effect, and that her chills got more intense after backing off instead of dissipating.

Back in the truck I skimmed the book I got (in trade for my poetry) about Baptist history in Montana and the first name that popped out was EVA, same name of the woman who went missing in Missoula and still hadn’t been found. Later skimming of the book put Eva in Texas, another theme that would quickly emerge in first 48 hours of traveling.

The driving got a little treacherous on the way down highway 93 (a big Crowley number), so I decided to stop in Salmon, Idaho, at the bar I had previously visited when I was researching the life of Glen “Harley” Stephens, the homeless man who died last year on the sidewalk in front of the building where the County Commissioners of Missoula have their offices.

I got some coffee and small talk and, on the way out, the bartender tossed me a canned coffee drink for the road. When I got back in the truck I saw the coffee was from Austin, Texas, which is one of my destinations–at least before an explicit warning I got at ANOTHER book shop, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Austin was already on my data-intake radar after hearing another synchronicity researcher, Michael Wann, mention it on a podcast interview. Austin is just south of Waco, Texas, and Dallas, where the Grizzlies blew their shot at the FCS championship. Did Waco emerge in another podcast I listened to? Uh, yeah, did it EVER, and the episode was a PsyOp Cinema one about the Terrence Mallick’s film, Tree Of Life, which takes place in Waco, and features the death of a brother as the core trauma for a main character in the film, played by actor SEAN fucking PENN.

Did I think about Sean Stevenson and the fact both he and his father were born in Pennsylvania? I did, and the synchronicities just kept coming. Here is a summary of the film from Wikipedia:

Around the 1960s, Mrs. and Mr. O’Brien are informed of the death of their 19-year-old son, R.L., throwing the family into turmoil. In 2010, eldest son Jack is adrift in his modern life in Dallas, Texas as an architect, disillusioned by his life full of disappointments. Meanwhile, voiceovers from Mrs. O’Brien ask God why R.L. had to die. Then, visuals depict the birth of the universe, followed by the creation of Earth and the beginning of life. At one point, a dinosaur chooses not to kill another dinosaur that is injured and lying on the side of a river bed. Finally, an asteroid strikes the Earth.

In a suburban neighborhood in Waco, Texas in the 1940s, the O’Briens are enthralled by their new baby Jack and later his two brothers, R.L. and Stevie. In the 1950s, Jack is conflicted with accepting the way of grace or nature, as embodied by his parents. Mrs. O’Brien, the embodiment of grace, presents the world to her sons as a place of wonder. Mr. O’Brien, the embodiment of nature, easily loses his temper as he struggles to reconcile his love for his sons, wanting to prepare them for a world he sees as corrupt and exploitative. He laments his decision to work in a power plant instead of pursuing his passion for music, and tries to get ahead by filing patents for various inventions.

I got to Pocatello and spent the first cold night sleeping in the box of my truck. I left just ahead of the polar vortex’s temperature plunge, but it was already getting damn cold for box truck sleeping, so I rested for a few hours then got back on the road for my first intentional stop: Lehi, Utah, in search of the elusive WHITE LION.

At a rest stop, while checking out local headlines, I came across this:

A fugitive wanted out of Missoula since October was apprehended on Thursday in Pocatello, Idaho, according to local officials.

Vincent M. Knight walked away from Missoula’s prerelease center on Oct. 30 while awaiting a hearing. Since then, there haven’t been any updates on his whereabouts, until now.

On Thursday, police got a call for a wanted person at a house on South Third Avenue in Pocatello, according to a Facebook post from the Pocatello Police Department.

I filed this away in my brain because it’s not the first time a headline told me about something happening in a place I had just visited. My last big adventure, which produced a manuscript documenting this same vein of craziness, had me in Philly the day riots broke out, ostensibly because of a court decision about a cop shooting someone, but really part of a larger trend of organized anarchy and coordinated looting among younger people sick of this shit.

I arrived in Lehi, Utah, early enough to case out the liar of the WHITE LION, or, more accurately, the Wags Capital Business Center, so that is why I actually SAW Aaron Wagner get out of his black truck, gym bag slung on his shoulder, and enter his building. 

Did I speak with Mr. Wags? No, this agile creature (former football player) moved too quickly, so by the time I realized it really was him, he was gone, and the building ONLY had key-card access, so no investor or inquisitive journalist could even think to enter and start asking questions.

My stop in Lehi was inspired by the mother who put Wags Capital back on my radar, resulting in this post about the viability of the big condo project that was supposed to replace the old Missoulian newspaper office building, situated ideally along the banks of the Clark Fork river. Since a restaurant brand of Wags Capital was seemingly having difficulty meeting payroll for its employees, I wondered if the parent company might ALSO be having financially difficulties. Nothing conclusive has emerged yet, but that hasn’t stopped me from giving juicy tips to real estate companies about my suspicions.

With the White Lion hiding in his corporate cage, I decided to call one more time, but no one answered, so I left a message with an offer to meet at the restaurant chain, if I could find one still open for business. I found a Kokonut Grill that said it would be open at 10:30am, so I went there and waited in the parking lot, but it never opened. There was a KONO Grill in the same strip-mall (also, I’ll note, a dessert place called Devil/Angel Desserts), so I went there instead, and had a nice chat with the bartender, who gave me free coffee and told me the Kokonut had only been closed for a few months.

I was itching to get back on the highway toward my next destination, since I was being enveloped by the polar vortex with every passing minute, but there was a problem. What was my next destination? I hadn’t picked one yet, since my allowance for intuition to direct my path is one method of producing synchronicity, but I knew the general direction I was going was through the Colorado Rocky Mountains, so that’s the direction I took.

Why did I choose to stay the night in Aspen? Well, Hunter S. Thompson, for one thing, and people with money, for another. Could I find someone to pitch my ideas to? And would there be a fun nightlife to explore? If the title of my poem, I Left My Turd In Aspen, is any indication, the night was shit, but on the road the next day Aspen took on MUCH more significance.

It was another podcast that got things started, this one an interview by Ed Opperman with muckraker journalist, David Wheeler. The topic? A political train-wreck by the name of Lauren Boebert, and the lawsuit she filed against Wheeler for defamation, which backfired delightfully, and the reason why is Dan Ernst, a lawyer based in Denver, which was the cityI was currently driving toward. 

You think that’s all? No, dear reader, there’s more. I learned, listening to this interview, that Boebert’s new boyfriend, who is apparently VERY liberal, owns a bar called the Hooch Craft Cocktail Bar, and this bar is located in…where? You guessed it, Aspen!

During my previous trip I had some imaginary conversations that helped me process some of this hard-to-fathom data, but for this trip I wanted something more immediate, so before Christmas I bought a stern looking stuffed octopus and asked my little girl to name it, so she did, and his name is TENTAPUS.

After shitting and sleeping in the box truck, a hotel room sounded like heaven, even if the location I decided on is the occult-laden location of Manitou Springs. Since Denver came up in the podcast, and since I reminded myself of the kick-ass bookstore I stopped at previously, Capitol Hill Books, Denver was my first frigid stop. After finding some great books, I let the map-app choose my route to Manitou, and the route took me by ANOTHER bookstore, one that looked to new and corporate to have the kind of books I search for, but then I saw the road sign: Aspen Grove. Ok, fine, I said to Tentapus, ONE MORE BOOK STORE.

Did I get a book? No, I got a warning to STAY AWAY from Austin after striking up a conversation with a guy who had been talking to his female friend about the Bank of International Settlements and the book Creature From Jekyll Island, written by G. Edward Griffin, someone who he knew personally. Damn! And to top it off, the woman behind the register countered my warning about Montana because, she said, she was from the “Missoula area”. Do you see how this shit can drive a person crazy?

By the time I arrived in Manitou Springs I was a little delirious from two nights of box truck sleeping, and I needed food, so I went to Border Burgers, where even the menu and background music fucked with me. I wanted a hamburger with blue cheese, which at Border Burgers is called “The Pittsburgh”. Yes, the city where Sean was born. And the song playing in the background as I wrote down my notes from the day’s travels? Blue Oyster Cult’s infamous song, Don’t Fear The Reaper. Ok then.

Exhausted and ready for a hot shower and warm bed, I checked in to the Villa Motel, and they put me in room 101 (of course). It was NFL Playoff Saturday, and my Kansas City Chiefs were scheduled to play the Miami Dolphins–Miami being the site of the weirdness that supposedly went down inside the Bayside Mall–but I wasn’t able to watch it. Why? Because the NFL is leveraging the popularity of number #15, Patrick Mahomes, in order to coerce football fans into PAYING for the Peacock’s exclusive streaming service.

Fatigue trumped anger at this blatant move by the “non-profit” known as the NFL, so I watched some shitty movies on cable instead, then went to sleep to recharge my batteries because this trip has only just begun.

Stay tuned…