Skydiving for my Man

6:30 am: SHIT!!! 

It’s the morning of the sky dive and I’ve over slept.  Thank God for my mum who taught me to always lay my things out the night before for the next morning.  I throw on P’s tee shirt, a fleece, jeans, and gym shoes, grab my bag, food for the day, and slap on a tiny bit of makeup.  I’m out the door by 6:42am.  Sprinting nearly all the way to the bus stop (I had to walk a bit. Note to self – do more sprint training!).  And I make it, with 2 minutes to spare.

A friend picks me up from the bus stop for the commute to the airfield.  The ride there seems to take forever.  The rain continues to pelt down, and the clouds do not appear to be shifting…..Everyone says to remain positive, that we WILL get to jump that day but I have learned the hard way that the ‘power of positive thinking’ does not always work.  I now live by the mantra ‘expect the worst and be pleasantly surprised when things DO go your way’.  

When we arrive the clouds seem to have parted just a bit.  An instructor gives us an abbreviated briefing as ‘the weather report is not good’ and they want to get as many people up as possible.  He is not optimistic.  He warns that some people might have to wait until 6pm to get up, some might not get up at all.  

Meanwhile, my only concern is NOT getting to jump!  The fear does not seem to have set in for anyone.  Everyone just wants to do it!  In total, there are 17 of us jumping in honour of P.  Only 2 can go up at a time.  

Finally at around 13:00 I get the call.  I do not feel nervous but my body is quivering with excitement and I find myself running to the loo a few times just to make sure.  My instructor is a tall ginger man who says he’s ‘not very good’.  He gets me suited and booted and I place P's photo safely in my pocket.  We drive out to the landing strip where the plane will pick us up and we wait, again.  I swear, the worst part is all the waiting!! I am NOT a patient person.  Then the videoing starts.  I have requested a video of my sky dive so a cameraman comes with us.  Before we get in the plane he asks me who I’m doing the jump for…..ugh, I wasn’t expecting this.  And I’m sure he was expecting to hear for ‘Leukaemia Research’.  ‘For my husband’ I say….in his memory.  Gulp.  

Going up in the plane was fantastic.  As we sat on the floor of the teeny tiny plane, my mouth dropped open as I sat in awe of the view that was unfolding outside.  As we climbed up and out of the clouds I felt a wave of calm wash over me as I said to P in my mind ‘be with me babe’.  Someone said to me ‘anyone who says he/she wasn’t afraid is a liar’.  I wasn’t really though.  Yes, my body was buzzing but there really wasn’t time to think about what I was doing and I knew he would be with me and he’d be taking care of me.  We scooted along the plane to get in position.  As soon as I was in the correct posture we were OUT!!!!!  And falling at 120mph!!! I couldn’t stop smiling or screaming!  The cold hit me like a ton of bricks.  It felt like I was flying through dry ice!  I smiled at the camera a few times and before I knew it the parachute had opened with a jolt and we were floating.  The ride down was so peaceful after the rush of the free fall.  As Al, my instructor whipped us around a bit, I held my arms out to the side and I felt like Rose in Titanic ‘I’m flying Jack! I’m flying!’ Ha-ha.  But really, I was.  I looked all around me and I thought ‘I can’t wait to do this again’.  Landing was the only time I got a bit nervous as I knew this is the part that can go horribly wrong very quickly.  I tucked my knees up and stuck my legs out as I had been instructed.  When told to stand up, I stumbled forward with the momentum, but stayed upright! Woo hoo.  Back on solid ground, mission complete. 

Now the adrenaline has worn off I keep thinking ‘I have to live on the ground now?’  Life is so much more exciting in the air! But more importantly, when things start to scare me, I now think ‘I jumped out of a plane! Why the hell am I scared? I have nothing to fear now.’  So thank you, P, for this gift.  I cannot fear death, for I know he is waiting for me on the other side, and I cannot fear the trials of everyday life because I jumped out of a plane and I loved every minute.