This is post number 2 on skydiving. Go here for how they looked in the air.
I could post a hundred photos of the ground part of the adventure. Showing how they did a dirt dive first, learning how to descend correctly and how to pull up their legs at the last minute, etc...but these photos called to me and so that's what you get.
The first one is a normal get ready photo. The second one is when my Magic son moved into the photo. I got a laugh out of that.
The four guys hamming it up on the ground.
Jimmy always has his mouth open in photos. It's just the way he rolls...
My three sons...They break my heart, all the time. :-)
I am glad they made it through this latest adventure and I am glad I let my son go and do it. I am sure it is something he will never forget...ever.
Boring admin first: You seem to have neglected to insert the "go here" link to the prior post, Angel. (I'm sure you'll want to take care of that.)
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Pay to be strapped to someone and forcibly hurled out of an in-flight aircraft? Uh-uh. No way. For me, the payment would have to be in the other direction and there isn't enough money on the planet!
I remember when I was young the family used to (on very rare occasions) stop by a local small airport and watch the activity for a while, including nearby skydiving preparation lessons. I seem to recall they'd do the stuff you're talking about on the ground, but they also would teach how to pack the parachutes and then have the person do it themselves (under close supervision and inspection). Back then I don't think they did the strap-on twosome thing... you trained, you packed, you jumped for yourself. Finally we'd watch the gang load up on the plane, take off, gain altitude and circle back around for the jumps. Luckily there were never any serious problems. (I think maybe once somebody didn't land too well and hurt an ankle or something.)
It's very possible I'm not remembering certain details or misremembering some stuff, but that's how I recall it. Never did I ever think, "Gee, I wish I was going up there too."
I'm just saying it's not for me. I've never even flown! Did you ever watch The A-Team? Remember Mr. T as B.A. Barackas? (Not sure how they spelled the name so I just Obamacized it.) The character was deathly afraid of flying, so they kept having to find ways to sneak up on him and drug him to be able to take him anywhere by air. That's me. I'm not proud of it, but I accept it.
I was on a roller coaster twice (I think) in my life... was not thrilled by the so-called thrill ride either time. And that was waaaaay before they started doing the fancy shmancy variations (loop-de-loops, backwards, hanging, etc).
Frankly, I'm not all that crazy about ladders and rooftops either. Climbing to the top of Barnegat Light is different as you're completely caged in while up there. The lighthouse itself would have to physically collapse for there to be any serious potential danger, but if that ever happens you're just majorly unlucky.
I watched This Emotional Life mon-wed this week and at one point they showed Katie Couric saying how if she is even on a high balcony she gets this odd feeling of anxiety about the height, not necessarily that she could realistically fall by accident, but just the mere (irrational) idea that she could somehow suddenly get the urge to go over the railing if she wanted. She has no intention of that, of course, but there's a part of the brain that whispers "what if..."
Even if you can't ever imagine WANTING to do it, you sometimes can't help imagine what if somehow I actually DID do it. Like I said, irrational. I'm thinking it's maybe sort of like a variant form of Tourette's, just not outwardly verbal. (And I know virtually nothing about Tourette's, so I could be absolutely 100% wrong there. I certainly mean no disrespect to Tourette's sufferers. It's just a simple, very probably inaccurate analogy from this layman.)
Sorry to go on so... I'm sure it's a thrilling experience if you're into the "rush" and all that and I'm glad they enjoyed it so much (and lived to tell). But...
"Life Starts at 120mph"?... Uh, no. Sorry. For me TERROR starts at 120mph. Actually, much sooner than that, like when leaving the ground. At 120 mph I don't think anything starts, I think it all STOPS... breathing, heartbeat, conscious thought, Oh look, it's Mom & Dad calling me to the light!...
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Hey Dim Skip!
ReplyDeleteYes, even before I checked in to see if any comment posted, I took care of the pesky link thing. You can't get the link, until the post appears on the blog. So I had to wait until after 3AM here in LA. What I do for my East Coast peeps. :-)
Funny you mention not wanting to fly. Back in my younger days, I would get disoriented on a plane, if I looked down. It doesn't happen anymore, but yeah, it was definitely there. Mild acrophobia, I guess.
I'm right there with Katie Couric: I'm not uncomfortable at all with heights, but looking down makes me want to jump.
ReplyDeleteMy former father-in-law broke both legs in a training jump in WWII, and yet I'd still be perfectly happy to be shoved out of an airplane with appropriate preparation. I like roller-coasters too. Flying on a commercial jet, on the other hand -- meh. These days it's probably easier to go sky-diving than to fly from St. Paul to Chicago.
I have heard that airborn types don't like landing in a plane. They would much rather take care of the entry to earth themselves. Interesting take on parachute jumping.
ReplyDeletePiglet, I so understand the not wanting to fly commercially. My legs have hated it for the past decade...and still I have to do it a few times a year.
Yeah, and for the longest time after 9/11/2001 I apparently had "TERRORIST" stamped on my forehead... middle-aged white professional woman with the standard black rolly-bag, yup, definitely fits the profile. ;-)
ReplyDeleteI can totally see the wisdom of the Airborne types -- I like to have control over things. I don't much like being in cars, but if I'm in one, I want to be driving.
My jump was the coolest....haha
ReplyDeleteWell, your jump was the one most documented... :-)
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