Skydiving

Proof you will never know how your day will end up when you get up, I met my friend Rick in the park Saturday morning for a 10k run.  Rick is getting married in about two weeks, and he we were talking about all the things that make up relationships on our run.  After the run was over, we didn't have anything to do so we decided to have lunch at Forrest Park's boat house.  We were sitting there having lunch and thinking to ourselves that we should do something fun...after all, he was getting married in a few weeks and the days of hanging out with a bud will soon be over for him without the proper permission form (just kidding Angela, but see the permission form I printed out for Rick to fill out).  He looks at me while we are waiting for lunch and asks if I want to go skydiving...without hesitation, I say yes!  I googled skydiving in St. Louis and came across Archway Skydiving.  I called them up and found out we could get in for a 4:30 jump.  We finished up lunch, I got a haircut and a shower, and we headed out to the skydiving place.  The first thing I noticed about a skydiving place is skydivers are....different.  They all had this very relaxed demeanor about themselves.  We watched a short training video which started off with a oddly yellow colored lawyer telling us we could die from skydiving and we shouldn't sue the joint (I believe the color of the lawyer had a lot to do with the fact this was a very old tape).  After that guy, a guy appeared on the video that told us some of the techniques of skydiving.  The thing he said most often during the video was "but you shouldn't worry about that"...just what you want to hear when you are throwing yourself out of a plane.

As the time grew nearer, Rick and I were all full of testosterone and vigor.  We were justifying our decision by saying things like "you know, its probably a lot more dangerous for us to drive on the interstate than to jump out of an airplane"  We had some time to kill, so we got some great Mexican food (the official food of extreme sports), and headed back to the skydiving place to get suited up.

We looked freaking awesome in our jumpsuits...almost like we knew what we were doing.  I felt like an astronaut walking out to the space shuttle as we walked towards the plane...we were all thumbs up and ready to go....then the plane started to gain speed down the runway, and the whole situation became very real...

As you can see from the expression in my face, all testosterone leaves you once the plane leaves the ground and a much more somber hormone takes over.  You start questioning your ability to make the simplest decisions, such as "Is it a good idea to throw oneself out of a plane".  As the time grew near, I knew there were simply too many other guys (and one girl) in the plane watching for me to chicken out.

We reached our jump height of 14,000 feet.  They opened the door of the plane and I was the first person to jump, which I'm thankful for because I did not have to watch anyone else do this.  The sensation of skydiving does not feel like you are falling, instead it feels like a 120mph vertical wind tunnel.  I had been talking smack all day, but I was very quiet on the way down, again probably thinking about what I must have been thinking about.  I was in freefall for over a minute, then the instructor and I floated down back to earth and had a very smooth landing.  As soon as I was back on the ground, my testosterone self took over once again and it was all high fives, thumbs up, and calling my parents letting them know I was ok.  Rick and I spent the car ride home pretty much talking about how badass we were.  I will post a video of the experience soon, but for now, enjoy the pictures. (click on the picture of me in the blue suit to see the full album)

Skydyving

Update: I've posted a video of the experience. It was wild!