Watkins took the prophecy seriously enough. One day, as he looked out a window of the Canoga Park house, he wondered to himself whether the violence of Helter Skelter would reach the Family. Indeed, it was apparently his fear that the Family was lingering too long in the soon-to-be-war-torn Los Angeles area that prompted him, in late June 1969, to ask Manson when the group would be leaving for the desert. Manson assured him Helter Skelter was "ready to happen." "t's gotta happen soon," Manson said, adding, with a wink, that the Family might have "to show blackie how to do it."