On Inflection Points

Sometimes our worlds pivot in an instant as we go through personal or collective inflection points. At times, we only become aware of it long afterwards. At other times we see it the moment it happens

This is going to be one of those “and now you know the rest of the story” pieces where you have to read to the very end. Enjoy.

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I have a GMC pickup truck, and it has an in-dash display like most newer model cars do these days. There is a special USB charging port on the console that you can plug your phone into; if you have the right software setup on your phone, it automatically starts up Android Auto (or the iPhone equivalent) on the display.

I use Google Maps a lot while navigating to places for work or for personal trips, so I have an ingrained habit of always plugging my phone in and starting up Android Auto, even if I’m only going from home to work or to the grocery store.

When I stop to jump out in a random field to take sunrise photos on the way to work, the GPS and navigation feature helps me figure out what time I’ll be arriving at the office.

This was a late model pickup in front of me on the way to work last week.

I also have things set up to show satellite imagery from Google Maps on my dashboard while I’m driving; I love seeing overhead details of what I’m driving past as I move along the dusty back roads.

It reveals things that you might never know about the places in your everyday world—things that you otherwise take for granted and drive blindly past every day.

Three decades ago, I worked with a team of Caltech-trained geniuses at TRW Space and Defense on Earth Observing Satellite projects for NASA contracts that TRW was bidding. One of these led our group to develop what may have been the first real-time hardware platform for delivery of full color digital imagery from EOS Satellites to research groups via the “Internet”.

When we did this work, the Internet as we all know it today didn’t exist; but there was an early precursor in the late 80’s and early 90’s already connecting universities, government agencies, and R&D firms.

I never foresaw that our team’s NASA contract work, 30 years ago, would lead to a day—such a short time later in the lifespan of humanity—where nearly everyone has GPS-enabled satellite navigation at their fingertips. I never foresaw that my daily life and work would be so dependent on it. (That’s me below on the right.)

Besides automatically bringing up Google Maps on my truck’s console display when I plug the USB cord into my phone, the Android Auto app also automatically starts whatever music app I had last been using. It resumes playing the song that was last in progress when I turned off the car the previous time.

I have a preference for using YouTube music and selecting a “supermix” category, which means that the service automatically selects tracks that it thinks I might enjoy as it continually randomizes my playlist with new “related” tracks.

It’s usually pretty good, but if I hear a song start playing that I don’t much care for, I just hit “skip” to go on to the next one.

Other than skipping tracks now and then, I don’t pre-select songs, and most of the time I have no idea what might play next. I just let it surprise me. I’ve found delightful new music this way that I otherwise might not have known about, so I tend to leave it set this way.

Now for some stories about all of this.

In December of 2021, I lost a colleague at work due to a complication from the mRNA injectables. I wrote about Alfred’s story here, in this post on substack. He was a good hardworking man, a great human being.

At 70, he wasn’t the best with picking up new technology—he never did write an email to anyone—but he knew how to send text messages like a pro, and once he got to know me, he’d send me silly pictures of himself or funny GIFs throughout the day. He had a wonderful sense of humor.

I miss Alfred, a lot.

I went to his funeral on January 3, 2022 and discovered a huge family that I knew nothing about: kids, grandkids, nieces, nephews, brothers, aunts, uncles. The Alfred whom I knew as a work colleague was but a small fraction of the total man. That realization made me miss him even more. He was a victim of the injectables tyranny.

A few days after the funeral, I was getting into my truck for work. I had been thinking about Alfred that morning, because his desk at our work office was only steps away from my own. The void of him not being there anymore was stark. I was reflecting on that and thinking about him as I mounted up into the truck cab for work.

As usual, I plugged in my phone…but strangely, this time YouTube Music did NOT start up and start playing.

Instead, my Telegram app started up (?) and began playing a song. I didn’t recognize the song at first, so I listened for a bit to figure out what it was. Telegram had never started up playing music before—and never has again, since that day. It happened once, and only once.

The song that was playing was “You’re going to miss me when I’m gone” by Brooks and Dunne.

I laughed to myself, and said out loud “Yes, Alfred. I am going to miss you. Thanks for the prank, old friend.”

When I got to work, I looked at Telegram on my phone to try to find where that song had even come from; I couldn’t find it in any of the channels I was subscribed to.

To this day, I have no good “conventional” explanation for you about how that song started playing right when I was thinking about and missing Alfred. It had been years since I’d last heard it. Nor can I explain why Telegram started up once, and only once—on that day—to play music when I started my truck.

In the time since, there have been many other occasions where a particularly relevant song was randomly playing in my truck in the morning as I left for work; or it began playing at the instant I saw a spectacular sunrise or sunset or scene that I wanted to photograph; or right after or just before a contextually meaningful text message from someone arrived.

This has brought into my awareness this quote from Carl Jung about Synchronicity:

Jung defined synchronicity as an “acausal connecting (togetherness) principle,” “meaningful coincidence”, “acausal parallelism” or “meaningful coincidence of two or more events where something other than the probability of chance is involved.”

Carl G. Jung (1960), Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, Princeton University Press, 2012, p. 44.

I didn’t really grasp what Jung meant by that when I was younger, but I see it happening more and more now, and I begin to have an appreciation for it.

It has also led me to think about what underlies this “synchronicity”, and about how we might come to understand and explain it; but that is the subject of future substack posts that I still have in draft form. But now, I have time to finish writing them…

Anyhow, on to a more recent story.

On Tuesday of last week, I wrote a piece titled “A New Year’s Miracle”. I had struggled for a while with that article, revealing as it did some details of my current life that few know about.

In order to help break free from the trap that I had fallen into since 2020, I felt it necessary to swallow my pride and ask for help. I did that, and I’m so deeply appreciative of all of you who responded and converted to paid subscriptions.

It has set me on a course toward rebuilding my life with my new love and her daughter. If you haven’t yet subscribed, it is helpful beyond measure if you would: you can do so here.

On Wednesday, as the skies began to clear in a short reprieve from the rains, I went out for a walk around mid-day, and captured this shot of the snow-covered Sierra as viewed through some concrete pipe in the work yard.

When I got back to my desk, I plugged in my earbuds to get back to work, and this song started playing.

How many coincidences before…

Last week was dark and stormy where I live in Central California, and when I left work to head home later that day on Wednesday, I was feeling the pressure of trying to find answers for what appeared at times to be insurmountable challenges.

As I came to a stop and was thinking about this, this song started to play:

And right after that, a song played entitled “ATLAS”. Just a few days prior, my fiancé had written to me saying “I do not want you to have the weight of the world on your shoulders” and with a realization of shock, I noted that I had been thinking of her, and that very message…on the way home. Just before that song started to play.

On Thursday morning, I left for work in the pouring rain, and saw a brilliant full moon setting as I drove to work. I wanted to stop and get my camera set up, but it was too dark to get a good photo. So I went on into work early, around 6am, to get a start on some projects that my colleague Molli needed. The world was weighing on me, that day.

During the day, two friends contacted me by text message, and I scheduled calls to talk to them later after work when I was back at home.

One of the two I spoke to later that evening is reading this article and will understand at a much deeper level the meaning of what I’m about to share.

As I headed home, the storm clouds were still heavy, but lifting towards the horizon where the sun was setting. As I was driving, I saw what looked to be a brilliant sunset shaping up; I knew from experience that capturing the perfect shot meant being in the right place, at just the right time, with only minutes or seconds to spare.

Seeing this sunset approach, I felt the rising thrill of getting a chance to capture a spectacular scene, so I was looking for a road to turn south on as the minutes sped by.

I decided to turn down an avenue that I don’t usually take, thinking I could quickly find an open field that would give me a good view to the west.

This is what I saw.

It was too dark for the camera to focus well, but the hue of the sunlight at that moment was a brilliant gold. It only lasted for a few minutes, but for that period of time the lighting was breathtaking.

But as I turned around, I saw something even more spectacular. If I hadn’t taken that particular avenue and stopped to capture that particular sunset to the west, I would never have look over my shoulder towards the east.

I would never have seen this, because it had been forming behind me as I drove west.

I’ve seen plenty of rainbows in my day, but I’ve never seen one quite as spectacular as this, an almost double rainbow split by a low cloud that hints at outstretched angel’s wings.

When I got back into my truck to complete the drive home and get set up for the evenings phone calls, this song began playing:

Two of the people reading this know what this means. Know that it cannot have been a coincidence. It was a message, a foreshadowing.

The next day, after the phone call, I felt a greater sense of peace than I can ever remember—because of the kindness of a friend who only recently came to know me. Still, he knows something of who I am at the deepest levels, already.

His action on Thursday created an inflection point, for me, and my beloved and her daughter. Our entire Universe pivoted, in a second, forever—because of what he chose to bless us with.

I took this shot on Friday:

The song below was playing on my truck stereo when I was done. This song, accompanying this brilliant image of bright sunshine and the promise of life-giving spring water soon to come from the Sierra snowmelt.

This song, with me and my beloved having awoken in a completely different Universe than the day before.

Synchronicity? You decide.

God already knows the answer.

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