Scariest Thing I've Ever Done... so far

On Saturday, I jumped out of a plane and hurdled toward the ground at 120mph. I have a certificate to prove it. And this certificate is getting framed and hung up, not hid under my bed like my diploma.

Ok, so it was a tandem jump. This means I have someone (Jerry) strapped to my back that is in charge of pulling the parachute. I did get to steer though!!

And secondly, it wasn't as much of a "jump" as it was a "with legs dangling out of the plane, lean out, and fall forward". Don't get me wrong; it was still scary as hell.

Let me back up a moment because this may seem very out of character for me. Truth is, it is. I did want to go skydiving, but the idea of going skydiving and actually doing it are 2 very different things. I had told this to my family, apparently it runs in the family because both my parents also wanted to go skydiving but both said they would go when the other one did, and therefore they never went. My mother was nervous and my dad said, "Cool, don't die." Jack literally beamed at the prospect. If you know Jack at all, you know this is most definitely in his character (he was disappointed the "jump" was from 10,000 feet and not 15,000 feet). Jack has bungee jumped, white water rafted, gone parapenting, climbed mountains, climbed a glacier, gone hang gliding, and will backpack through Europe this Fall for 2 months and these are just the things he has told us about. And some of them were not even on this continent. The more we talked about it and the more I looked into it, the more excited I got. I decided this would be a perfect present from me to Jack. We tried to go twice in 2005 but Mother Nature had other plans. Jack then tried to go at least twice while in Australia. Again, Mother Nature.

I then deemed this my graduation present to Jack. We tried to go in July but it seemed now Mother Nature had fate on her side as well and both of them were laughing hysterically at us. I think maybe my Mother also had something to do with it. Maybe she gave Mother Nature money. She very much did not want us to do this. And when we had made the date in July she decided to run off to Nantucket for the weekend so she wouldn't be sitting around thinking about her two babies plummeting to the ground from 10,000 feet. She thought that was the end of it, like we had given up or something. We rescheduled to September 16, 2006. This past Saturday. We prayed for good weather. I think Mother Nature and Fate were hung over from Friday night drinking because by the time the clouds set in, we were already on our way into the air and the Skydive place had deemed our jump the last jump of the day.

We got there right on time, traffic and construction tried to delay us but we persevered. We arrived and literally signed our lives away. Have you ever signed one of these things? It states that there is a high risk of death due to machine malfunction, human error, or any unforeseeable malfunction, which might arise. You must sign that you know you are putting your life at risk and could die today. Was it wrong that I was chuckling?

And after signing the forms, a very nice gentleman went over the forms with us, just to make sure we knew what we had signed. He then went into the process and what we would have to do. I.e. hold onto our shoulders upon jump until instructed otherwise, shape our bodies like bananas until told otherwise through non-verbal ways, and how to prepare for landing. He then explained about the chute, which I found interesting. There were 2 parachutes, a backup chute just in case. And the chutes could be manually released or if we reached a certain height from the ground and the chute had still not been deployed, a computer would recognize this fact and deploy the chute for us. Sounds safe right? Believe me, I was comforted by the fact that I was strapped to the instructor.

I had to go first. I didn't want to go first but my brother called second before I knew what happened. Jack, myself and the two instructors squeezed into this tiny thing of a plane. It was like a toy plane for a giant. I was teamed with Jerry. He was friendly and terrific despite his jokes on the way up where he pretended to get his left and right hands mixed up. Not good when one of those hands is responsible for our lives, but I was not worried. Not about jumping at least. I was worried that I wasn't worried enough. I know how that sounds but I am a worrier. But I was very proud of myself for not being worried... yet. I got worried when Jerry told me he was now going to open the door at which point we would dangle out feet out of the plane, one by one. I looked down. Okay, now I was nervous.


Am I really going to do this? I thought to myself. Before I had time to answer my question or even think about my question, Jerry said go, and we fell out of the plane.

OH... MY... GOD!

I'm going to repeat that for necessary emphasis.

OH... MY... GOD!

My first instinct was to start climbing my body back up itself and jump back into the plane. My stomach was first. It seemed like it was running back to the plane faster than Steve Carell ran outta the office during "The Fire" episode of the tv show, The Office. It was the scariest thing I had ever experienced. I don't know how long it took me to relax, but it was shorter than 30 seconds. The freefall was now amazing. I shaped myself like a banana and was very glad I was holding onto my shoulders, it felt comforting and I didn't let go even when I was given the signal that it was okay. I could feel the air flowing into my eyeballs despite my goggles and I could not help but smile while trying to focus on breathing through my nose. (The DVD of the jump may reveal otherwise. I would like to YouTube it and I'll put a link on the blog.) I had absolutely no sense of time at this point. Jerry was strapped tightly to my back and I was very glad for that. I think I just got comfortable with falling when Jerry, unbeknownst to me, pulled the chute. At first it seemed like we paused mid air and I didn't know what the heck was happening. Then it seemed like we were being sucked back up into the sky by some sort of vacuum. I grabbed my shoulders again. I don't know why I didn't make the connection that it was the chute at first, but I didn't. Perhaps you're not as sensical when freefalling to the ground at 120 miles per hour for the very first time in your life.

The chute opened (Yay!). Ok, lame, I know. But I did get a happy feeling when the chute opened. And then we coasted down to the ground. Jerry let me steer and we even spiraled to the ground at certain points like we were being guided by a large spring. This made me dizzy. Jerry asked how I liked it. It was hard for me to catch my breathe which I was convinced had gotten knocked somewhere else while we were being sucked up by the vacuum. I could laugh however, and laugh I did until I found my breathe. At which point I think I told him that it was awesome, or amazing, or scary, or, to be honest I have no idea what I said.

The view was amazing. What else could you expect from a parachute flight overlooking the scenic Newport Coastline on what I thought to be the most perfect day? We glided down and the dots below me came into focus revealing other planes, cars, and houses. As we neared the landing field I swore I could pick up the little planes below me as though they were toys and I even tried to do so. Apparently you also temporarily lose your spatial reasoning. We landed safely in a field at the airport. I cannot even describe the way my body felt. It was like nothing I'd ever felt before and I do not have the vocabulary to come close to doing it justice. I didn't want to get up, I wanted to lie in the field for a few minutes and let my body adjust to being on the ground. I could not stop smiling though. I was a grinning idiot. I watched Jack land. He was a grinning idiot as well but seemed to not need any recovery time.

We both crashed very early later on after a stop at No Problemo and Buzzard's Bay Brewery. The perfect way to end a fantastic day.

eyes

I have become quite worried about my eyes. I have almost perfect vision and I want to keep that for as long as I can. Recently I've felt that my vision is declining somewhat which makes me nervous. I sit in front of a computer for most of my day at work and I do occasionally read when the lighting is dim (not so much anymore). My mother needed glasses when she was 28 and perhaps I am worried about that. Anyway, I am probably just over reacting. Not sure where this worry came from but I have been doing more eye exercises, don't laugh.

is it time to leave yet?

I've been leaving some Sorbet in the freezer at work. It is perfect for when you need a pick-me-up at work. Take today for example, it is beautiful outside and I'm having trouble getting through this already shortened work week. But having some strawberry sorbet at 4 in the afternoon on a Thursday helps. If I'm ambitious I will make a smoothie with it. Yum. I put it in my Alumni coffee mug and it takes a lot of restraint to not fill it up again.