Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
–Winston Churchill
As many of you may know I’m like the majority of the world and scared of heights. Friday, June 1, 2012 (New Zealand’s first day of winter), I had the courage to face my fear and ascended to 12,000 feet (~2.25 miles) before being pushed out of an airplane.
This would be the wonderful activity known as skydiving. After waking up ridiculously early, dealing with a broken city bus, and riding in a clown car for 3.5 hours with a crazy driver on windy New Zealand roads, we arrived at Skydive Zone-Bay of Islands. Thankfully Christina and I didn’t have to wait long to jump, we were the first of seven plane loads. After filling out a couple safety forms, paying for our proof, and receiving verbal safety instruction, we met our professional jumping buddies, suited up, and took off.
Surprisingly I felt quite calm: no hyperventilating, no nausea, no general freaking out/panicking, nothing. While taking off, the nerves became anxious and I thought to myself, “Faith and trust. Faith and trust. I know this phrase from somewhere, but there’s more to it. There’s nothing but faith and trust. Yes, but there was something after faith and trust. And where do I know this phrase from?…faith, trust, and, and what? There’s nothing to it but faith, trust, and…PIXIE DUST! Peter Pan and Tinkerbell’s pixie dust to help the kids fly to Neverland.” This isn’t completely random, I watched Peter Pan and Return to Neverland the weekend before.
With that mystery solved, I resumed staring out the window. It was a beautiful day and perfect skydiving weather: sunny with light clouds and warm, 17-18°C (~62-65°F). As we passed through the clouds another phrase stuck in my mind: up above the clouds…so high. “Up above the clouds? That’s not right; it’s up above the…twinkle, twinkle little star, up above the world so high. Well that works too because at this height I’m up above the world and oh, so high. I’m not sure if we’re high enough to be considered a diamond in the sky though, maybe a line.” Between these two mental conversations with me, myself, and I, the 20 minute plane ride to 12,000 feet had almost passed. Brent, my professional jumping buddy, tightened the straps on my harness and finished attaching our harnesses, so I wouldn’t go falling through the air alone. I spent the remaining minutes admiring the Bay of Islands and 90 Mile Beach.
Christina and her professional jumping buddy went first. With the door open, I had a better view of the distant ground and couldn’t believe what I’d gotten myself into. I know I’m not crazy for skydiving; it’s an extremely normal thing to do, but the ground was really far away. I mean like really far away; I couldn’t see any houses, just square, farm fields.
Brent and I scooted towards the open door and then I just hung over the edge. I assumed the ‘banana’ position as the safety instructor called it by tucking my legs underneath the plane, grabbing the straps on my shoulders, and leaning my head back (so Brent could see passed me). At least now I couldn’t see the ground, or maybe that wasn’t a good thing. Once Brent let go of the plane, I felt like we were sucked out, so this initial falling was by far the scariest part of the jump, especially considering we rolled and I went from seeing the approaching ground to the brilliant blue sky. I’m too much of a control freak to not see where we were going.
As we left the plane the first of two involuntarily screams escaped. The rolling through the air while plummeting at 9.8m/s/s didn’t help the screaming and took my scared of heights to terrified of heights. I was better once my first involuntary scream finished and I could, again, see where we were falling to, despite another briefer scream escaping. I screamed at least the first half of the approximately 40 second free fall, but the voluntary screams were accompanied by a smile and enjoyment 🙂 Truthfully I enjoyed free falling more than after the parachute deployed because free falling was more thrilling (after the initial shock).
The exhilarating scary was over at approximately 5,000 feet when Brent deployed the parachute. Here I realised how little I was breathing while free falling. After catching my breath, I had a chance to steer the parachute. To turn right, I pulled down really far with my right arm and let my left arm go all the way up. This would have worked better for me if I had the arm strength to pull a parachute that far down and my left arm would cooperate and go up. I was happy observing the ground gliding closer as the Bay of Islands and 90 Mile Beach disappeared beyond the shrinking horizon.
A soft landing ended my 12,000 foot adventure. I enjoyed falling and gliding through the air, but I like having both feet on the ground 🙂 I was so proud of myself for surviving without making a fool of myself, I threw my hands into the air and sighed. If skydiving wasn’t so expensive, I’d definitely do it again. Instead, I’ll convince myself bungy jumping is close enough and give that a shot too!
Unfortunately the rest of my weekend wasn’t as exciting as skydiving. I started planning my trip to the South Island for my final week in New Zealand. There’s a lot I want to do, but I have some number crunching before deciding exactly what to do. I couldn’t spend too much time planning though because I’m still not done with my final reflective portfolio. Hopefully, I’ll be done by next weekend, so I can enjoy my final weeks, stress free 🙂
“I promise to come home to you…Don’t count the miles, count the I love yous” –“Miles” by Christina Perri
I love you!!! –> For facing my fear of heights
I love you!!! –> For enjoying my skydive
I love you!!! –> For travelling on my free-time
I love you!!! –> For focusing on my studies
ILYs: 161
Check out my video: http://youtu.be/wBISm2jnd2w
Bethany Blount 