Skydiving and family

[lewmonst 0]

well, i went to quincy instead of my brother's wedding last year... but it was his fault, i'd preregistered months ago, was traveling with someone, and had a ticket for the (invisible) jet jump on friday. i was driving on wednesday... so my brother tells everyone on tuesday that he's getting married on friday. but if it was a big deal anyway he would have given more than 3 days notice :)
first time i jumped, i looked up skydiving in the yellow pages. found a couple places, called, and borrowed mom's car the next day at the crack of dawn to go take the class by myself. mom calmly freaked and called my dad, after i had left. i didn't know it until i was putting on the orange (spot-the-missing-student) jumpsuit and i turned around to him holding a video camera...
since then, dad has always been my biggest fan, getting to the dz before me, sometimes without even knowing if I'm even going that day. I lost my protrack and wasn't going to buy a new one b/c of $ and he offered to pay for half. Won't help pay for new gear unless i get a bigger parachute. no thanks dad (smile) but i've only gotten him to go for 1 ride in the plane in the last 4 years of all this... he's even thinking of coming to quincy this year. the more he learns about how it all works and why we love it so much, the more he likes it. he even tells me how many points we got watching through his binoculars when i land :) and watches my video de-dirts... but i doubt i'll ever get him out the door.
mom's cool, after coming to watch for 2 years, i bought her a tandem for her 53rd birthday, she loved it.
i must say that i've never consciously thought about chosing between family or skydiving, but i know i have and do it all the time... and in the last 3 weekends i've travelled to cleveland, deland and chicago to jump...
luckily now i am only responsible for myself. but i would definately not stop jumping for anyone. it is a part of who i am. and if anyone is a part of my life, they get skydiving too.
whuffo boyfriends never have lasted very long.
what color is your wristband?
(am i still a newbie)
lew

[nimbus 0]

I don't think family or real friends should ask someone to make a decision like choosing between them and something you love...
I'm really lucky that my whuffo friends totally support me and think it's fantastic that I'm doing this.... they were as disappointed as I was when I chickened out of my Lvl 3 jump and keep asking me when I'm going back to do it.
When my mum and grandmother watched my Lvl 1 video, mum had to walk around the room saying "oh, I feel sick!" Nana watched it and said "I wouldn't do it for a million dollars but if it makes you happy, you keep doing it". I can tell mum is happy when she asks if I've been jumping and I say "no, it was too windy" or "no I wasn't ready"... she's quite an anxious person so I know what an effort it is for her to even have a conversation with me about it. When I dipped out of the Lvl 3 jump due to panic she said "oh well, you probably shouldn't do it if you don't feel right at the time"... I told her how other jumpers on the day had said the same thing to me and she thought that was very sensible of them.. I said "Oh yes, skydivers are all very sensible people", feeling extremely grateful that she hasn't seen them on Saturday nights at the town pub or after the pub back at the dz!
My dad was really proud of me and was very impressed with my stand-up landing for Lvl 1 - he wanted to be a pilot when he was young so I think he understands a bit.
My brother just calls me crazy, but then he always has ("Weirdo techno hippy sister!" is one of his favourite lines).
I think my cats understand.
I think a friend who made you choose wouldn't be a real friend, but family is a bit different. Luckily mine don't hassle me about it, they accept it even though they may not like or understand it.
At my dz there's a whole family (parents & two teenage boys) who jump - it's fantastic.
As for partners, the person who introduced me to skydiving was my boyfriend, now friend, but I'd love to go out with another skydiver, although I'd like to have other common interests as well.
It would be terrible to have a skydiving friend die in an accident.... it's terrible to lose anyone and you just never know... I know 5 people who have committed suicide, and several others who overdosed (including my partner who accidentally - I'm sure - overdosed on his psychiatric prescription medication)... losing people in your life due to an accident or tragic circumstance or their own decision is always awful. I feel like I owe it to my partner to get double the amount out of life. Skydiving certainly helps me do that...
larissa

[Digitalmafia 0]

Glad I read this post (from skymama). I am done with AFF and on solo and really becoming hooked-my wife is pretty cool about it (she gave me jumps for xmas :) but I have been playing the thinking game and fu*king my head up thinking about my amazing lil 2 year old daughter not having me around-Being a student pre A jumper it dosent take much more then a few busy weeks tween jumps or reading a ton of post about Mals to let the itch of fear creep in (course one jump and im cured).

3 of us at my office all had kids within 3 months - everyone kinda trips on my skydiving while at the same time they get something from my monday morning tales of jumping out at 14k n chasing cars on the hwy while tracking my ass off - while they spent their Sunday at Home Dept...:) Although I did have one wife say that her husband would never do that because of their child (who plays with mine)...I told her I wanted to be the kind of Father who lives life to its fullest - not a football watching, couch potato, passenger of life and I thought my daughter would be better off with a Dad like me. I did triple ck that my life insurance covers skydiving and I did change it to payout at 4x's my salary...does that mean im paranoid?-hehe. Any how enjoyed the post skymama. I think i simply need to jump more often ;)