The madre had told my sister that she would take her skydiving for her 21st birthday and they were so kind to include me on this trip. It is something that we all talked about wanting to do. To add to this day the madre told us she wanted us to think about our fears, write them down, and then we would release them as we were falling from the sky. Pretty symbolic don't you think? I totally loved the idea. And as you can tell from some of my past posts I've been thinking about my fears. Fears that I will not share with you...today at least. But, after this experience I do know that putting energy into those fears makes them real and once you realize your energy is being invested in the wrong places those fears don't seem as scary. Not that they will disappear overnight, but they don't have as tight of a grip and if you continue to work on diverting those energies they just might go away. Life is short and you need to enjoy it!
As the weeks and days got closer our nerves grew and then there was THE day. We awoke early and you could feel the nervous excitement in the air. The madre seemed more terrified, sis really nervous, and I was more excited than anything. Maybe I was overcompensating my excitement to help ease their nerves? I mean don't get me wrong, I was definitely nervous, but the excitement overpowered it.
Anyways, we arrived about an hour early (we don't like being late) and walked into what appeared to be an empty building with a cute, but "not sure if you're friendly" dog attached to a leash. Unsure of where to go we kind of just stood there until Mike happened to walk by. Mike, who would be my videographer and the madres tandem buddy, is a retired military man who has been jumping out of planes for years. He had something like 5,000 jumps under his belt. Also, had the right kind of sarcastic humor to put us at ease.
I was expecting to have an hour or so long class of skydiving safety, but it was really a 15 min crash course of here is the plane, this is how you sit in it and turn around to attach to your buddy, and when the door opens sit your butt on the edge and let your buddy push yourselves out. Okay who is ready to fall out of a plane? This is not even an exaggeration it was that quick.
I nominated myself as the first person to go. Again, surprising myself at my bold "let's do this shit" attitude. Who is this girl and can I keep her around? I think I will! Anyways, I was introduced to Brad my tandem buddy (who would end up being so close to me he really should have bought me dinner afterwards) and he harnessed me up. I'm sure I was completely inappropriate with my comments in front of a perfectly good southern gentleman stranger. Saying things like, "this is the one time I'm glad I have small breasts" as he is politely explaining to me I may want to adjust the strap across my chest because for females it could be uncomfortable. It's okay though...I'm pretty sure Brad ended up having a little crush on me (mind you he could probably be my dad).
So, we were geared up and ready to get on the plane. My excitement is bubbling over at this point. I sit exactly as I was told, Brad climbs in and sits his legs on top of mine, Mr. Pilot is doing his thing, Mike jumps in next to pilot with his helmet video camera capturing it all, and in jumps another guy! Okay y'all this plane is small and I was quite shocked to see homeboy jump in. Me: "well hello stranger are you going to be jumping with me as well?". Turns out stranger (Brian) is one of the guys who is getting his license and will be jumping at 5,000 feet.
The entire ride up Brad and I are
5,000ft in the air, the door opens and we say our goodbyes to Brian. It was pretty freaking cool to watch someone fall out of a plane (I say fall because there really is no jumping involved).
9,000ft and it's time for me to turn around and snuggle up to the back of the pilots chair as Bradly attaches himself to me. We got close...very close and I kind of felt like I was a baby attached to his chest with one of those baby carriers (what the hell are those things called?). To which he laughed at me when I expressed this. I also made Brad promise me that we could do a flip out of the plane because that sounded like more fun.
10,000ft and it's GO TIME! Mike opens the door and makes his way out so that he can capture my experience. Brad and I scoot to the door and I sit as close to the edge as I can, the excitement out of control now. I failed to thumbs up the camera as I was concentrated on arms crossed. ONE...TWO...THREE...and I felt Brad summersault us out of the plane.
I kept my eyes open the entire time and I wish I could do justice to just how phenomenal the experience really was. No lie when I say it is by far the most amazing experience of my life thus far. Freefalling is exhilarating, but it didn't seem to last all that long before you do feel the jerk of the parachute opening. Then you are just floating in the air. Pulling the strap left when you want to go left and right when you want to go right. You can even twirl and twirl we did! We even went through a cloud. I was the happiest little girl in the sky! I could have stayed up there for hours.
Now comes the landing. We are getting close to the ground and I thought I heard Brad say "flare", so I began to pull the straps. Not what Brad said! We ended up crashing our asses onto the hard ground. I'm pretty sure I broke my ass from that land. But, I was a champ and brushed it off, getting right up and laughing it off. I think I was just high from the adrenaline rush. Despite the not so great land, I would totally do it again! Like I think I can become addicted to this!
In fact, Mr. Brad was so impressed with how much of a natural I was he said that I should come and take classes to become a tandem master or do the competitions. At first I thought he was blowing smoke up my ass, but after hearing him say that the entire float down and before I left, I can only assume that I am, in fact, a natural ;) Holy conceded...but I'm just excited that I did a good job! I'm also seriously considering taking the classes.
I should add that the madre and sister LOVED it as well. Also, the madre was the only one who landed on her feet (to which Mike said: " you know you're standing because of me right?"...haha loved Mike)!
Now I need to go ice my ass...
Sounds AWESOME.... Good for you! MS
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