I found this today I wrote it the day after my aff level 1. I haven't checked the spelling or grammer so cut me some slack it was a long time ago? It has always amazed me how much stuff can go through your head in a split second when you think your going to die. I’d waited my whole life for this moment for the door of the plane to open and the jumpmaster to say move out. When you feel the wind in your face and your heart starts to pump so hard you think it’s going to explode. You watch the first jumpmaster move out on the step over the airplane wheel and you realize that it’s only as big as a license plate and three grown men area about to be balanced on it at twelve thousand feet hanging of the side of a small Cessna aircraft. You move to the door and put one foot out into space. The plane is flying at eighty miles an hour so the wind tears at your jumpsuit as you try to put your foot out on that precariously small step. I couldn’t help but wonder how the jumpmasters both looked so relaxed. I know they have done this thousands of times but it’s hard to imagine getting to a point where you would consider this a relaxing experience. With one foot on the step, like someone putting a warm blanket over you when your shivering from the cold the fear goes away and all that’s left is the cold realization that you are going to do this, not to impress anyone or so you can brag to your friends but because at this moment you know what it means to be free. All the things you thought were important mean nothing, the bills, the times you failed or the times you succeeded, are washed away and replaced with self-confidence, a confidence so strong that you know it will change everything about you, and it feels good. I looked at the jumpmaster still in the plane and he said “okay” so I move my other foot out onto the step into the little open space I left between my foot and the foot of the jumpmaster, who is watching all your movements with a smile that tells you he remembers what you are feeling and you realize that he teaches so that other people can know this true feeling of being at one with everything around you. When your foot finds that three-inch open space on the step, you let your other foot slip off the step and trail behind you in the chilling wind that still tears at you relentlessly. I looked to my left and say “check in”, I heard a strong reassuring voice say “okay”. I look right and say “check out”. I see that same relaxed smiling face reply “okay”. I looked forward focusing on the front of the plane and say “prop”, “up” and I push myself up against the bottom of the wing. Your going to do it, not doing it never crosses your mind there is no fear no pressure there is only right now. You say down and you relax and move downward. This is it, this is what it’s all been for “ARCH”, and you let go! The rest of this story cannot be explained with words. So I leave it you. All it takes to know the ending is one little step…. 12000 ft DAN SMITH www.skydivewichita.com
