..you jump from a plane.
The husband always asks me if I ever get the urge to jump from an aircraft when it is thousands of feet from the earth’s surface, and my answer has always been a firm NO.
Friends were planning a group skydiving trip and roped us in. I tried to chicken out by making some lame excuse about a friend visiting, but that fell on deaf ears! A date and a venue for the said event was decided upon, and reservation amounts paid. The husband was cool as a cucumber as the fateful day approached, and always told me I needn’t make the jump if I did not want to! It was going to be a tandem jump(meaning the jumper would be tied by harness to the expert skydiver and we would jump together, and two such sets of people would jump off from each plane trip). Everyone else had a partner/spouse who would be taking off and jumping from the same plane. Until we got to the venue I was 100% sure I would not jump, but when we got there he said something to the effect that how it would be boring for him to be all alone up there and jumping off without me by his side(yeah, right!) and my cowardly little heart melted just a little bit for me to sign forms that said it was my responsibility if I died doing the stunt and they are not responsible for any injury or death. Before I knew it I was standing there by the aircraft, ready to board the plane! What was I doing, why the hell was I here, what was the point of this exercise, what if something went wrong, these were the questions I kept asking myself. My questions notwithstanding, the four of us, me, my instructor, the husband, and his instructor huddled into the aircraft(well we literally had to squeeze in, it was a teeny tiny plane) and took off into the almost dusky skies. My instructor, John, who was tied to the harness on my back, tried to take my mind off the impending task and showed me the pretty landscape below, I nodded but was mentally making myself ready to jump. So at about 10,000 feet he opened the aircraft door and instructed me to put my feet out and push myself out of the aircraft, head first, with my back straight and head upright. I flat-out REFUSED to put my feet out. He asked me nicely one more time to put my feet out and hurl myself out of the safety of the aircraft, I REFUSED yet again. This time he lifted me up by my harness and PUSHED ME OUT. There I was, soaring in the air like a bird, with John tied to me, yelling into my ear, asking me if I was liking the ride. I was too busy counting seconds to reply. This was free fall and I was loving it, contrary to my expectations. He turned on the camera and I remember I said something loud and unintelligible. After about 30 seconds, that felt like 2 seconds, the parachute opened and we were not free-falling anymore, we were gliding slowly across waters, forests and the beach. A good 4 minutes of gliding later it was time to land, and land we did, safely! And that is how 10 crazy people jumped willingly out of planes on saturday evening, jumped because there was nothing better they thought they could do nothing better with their time. And I thoroughly enjoyed the experience!
Next the crazy friends and the equally crazy husband want to bungee-jump. I said a firm NO but I am sure I will be dragged along and dropped off a cliff!
shilpadesh
Just Speaking My Mind 