Peoria, IL. February 16, 2012, 11:41 A.M.

Simpler times. I was a fresh, naive college kid. Fearless. Invincible. Untouched by the restless ghosts of our 40th President. I sat through Dr. Gobeyn’s rant hate-filled diatribe lecture on Reaganomics in my Comparative Public Policy class with some semblance of attention, retaining the majority of a lesson that could conservatively be called “resentful” and perhaps more accurately “vengeful.” As I traipsed out of class, I sent the following status update to Facebook:

“I think Ronald Reagan ran over my professor’s dog or something. This class has been 75 minutes of fury.”

That was my first mistake. Unbeknownst to myself, I had stirred the ghost of a spiteful apparition. I put myself on his radar. And then I strolled right into his domain.

Dixon, IL. March 9, 2012, 5:00 P.M.

Dixon, Illinois, is a small-ish central Illinois town of around 15,000. One of those quaint midwestern towns that has an equal ratio of Protestant churches, barbershops/hair salons, and bars. There are no other commercial buildings in Dixon.*** I would know, I was there.

Dixon also happened to be the second stop on the Bradley Chorale spring tour. We were to give a concert that night in one of the 15*** Protestant churches in the four-square-block area of downtown Dixon. During a bit of down time, I noticed a portrait of Mr. Reagan in the church’s cafeteria. Interest piqued, I mentioned the arbitrariness of it to my choral director, who smiled knowingly and told me, “Yeah, they like him around here.”

I hadn’t put two and two together at that point, but long story short, we had the concert, went to our homestays, and were given freedom to roam scenic Dixon at our leisure. That’s when I started to see the plaques. Lots of them. Reagan went to church here, had a library card there, hit a grand slam playing stickball against the USSR over yonder. That’s when the realization finally hit me: I was in the boyhood home of Ronald Reagan.

But even with this realization, I didn’t remember a three-week-old Facebook status connecting me and the cosmic debates occurring on another plane of reality. I sat in a shitty pizza joint, Mama Cimoni’s, and mocked the Reagan portrait hanging on the kitchen wall. “Look at that smarmy git. With his wrinkles and his jowls. Plotting how he can screw over more poor people. It’s like he’s got eyes everywhere in this town.”

Unfortunately for me, he did.

Cosmic Golf Course in the 4th Dimension. Time: Unknown. Date: Unknown

(Scene: Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan sit at an umbrella’d table at some celestial country club. They drink equally umbrella’d drinks, and laugh heartily at the golfers who pass by without the good sense to hire some disadvantaged Hispanic gentleman to caddy their bags.)

Goldwater: “…so then I said, that’s no giraffe, that’s my wife! Ha!

Reagan: “Barry, that was the worst joke I’ve heard in my two lives. Pass the jellybeans, you half-wit.”

Goldwater: “Ha…ha…yes sir. So we’ve had some troubling reports from our portraits in Dixon. Some punk kid said you killed a dog a few weeks back. Now he’s put himself right on our radar.

Reagan: “So he spreads slander against my name and then strolls into my domain? Well you know what I say, Barry. Better to be criticized for what you’ve done than what you haven’t done.”

Goldwater: “Sir…you can’t possibly mean…an attack on a civilian house pet…It’s unprecedented.”

Reagan: “You think we beat those Soviet commies by following precedent? Does Star Wars mean ANYTHING to you? Launch the attack!

*******************

Dixon, IL. March 10, 2012. 9:00 A.M.

I get a call from my Mom as we’re sitting down for breakfast. Due to some supernatural witchcraft, one of the family dogs didn’t make it through the night. He was old, she tells me. He was sick, she tells me. But I know better. THE GHOST OF RONALD REAGAN KILLED MY DOG. I recently installed Timeline to find out the exact date and time of the taunts thrown out into the cosmic abyss. And I suppose I’ve learned my lesson. Don’t mess with dead 40th Presidents.

Wait. I installed Timeline. I was one of the last holdouts from the old profile to switch over to Timeline. Could it be? Could there be another force involved in this murder?

DID MARK ZUCKERBURG CONSPIRE WITH THE GHOST OF RONALD REAGAN TO CONVERT ME TO TIMELINE?

*****TO BE CONTINUED*****