ObscuroRant

Fearless Part II, or, My Mind's Playing Tricks on Me

Once I exited the plane, I was suddenly no longer afraid.

Not, it should be added, because I found a sudden wealth of courage. Nor was it because I somehow vanquished my fear by confronting it.

I simply wasnt feeling anything. My mind had gone utterly blank. My brain was totally on the blink; my thought process brought to a crashing standstill. I was overwhelmed by the fact that I had just committed the completely illogical act of stepping out of the airplane, and by the fact that the wind roaring in my ears and buffeting my body was me, plummeting towards the ground at a speed fast approaching a hundred miles an hour and beyond.

This type of sensory overload is not an uncommon phenomenon among first-time jumpers. Hell, out of a morbid sense of curiosity Id even read accident reports concerning students that never recovered from it, and the bad things that befell them. Walking out to the plane earlier, S had said to me, Dont worry. Even if you completely freeze up there well still be able to pull your ripcord for you. I found these words to be of dubious comfort.

I floated in a sea of disbelief for what seemed to be an eternity. Gradually I became aware of a small voice in the back of my head, tugging on my sleeve and trying to get my attention.

Shouldnt we be, you know, doing something right now?

An absurdly reasonable response burbled up from somewhere in my mind.

Good idea. Wed better get our head in this game.

And with that I snapped back to a very panicked full awareness of my situation. For fucks sake, how long had I frozen? How much altitude had I lost? Had I blown the whole jump? What was I supposed to be doing at this moment?

Arch. That was the first thing that popped into my head. I needed to arch: to throw my pelvis out towards the ground and bend my body into a bow, with my arms and legs in a slightly elevated Y before and behind me. I needed to arch hard so I would fall in a stable position, instead of skittering all over the sky. I remembered Cs words ground school. Looking me up and down critically shed said, Youre light the winds going to knock you around an awful lot up there. Youre going to really have to arch hard to remain stable. Well, at that particular moment I was arching as hard as humanly possible.

I checked my altitude, then looked to my left the Jumpmaster flashed me the thumbs-up sign. I looked to the right another thumbs up. Apparently I was now falling in a good stable position. Now I needed to make three practice ripcord touches, to make sure I could find the damn thing when it came to pull for real. I swung my left arm out in front and dropped my right arm back towards my side, grasping for the ripcord on my right hip. I couldnt find it.

I knew full well the ripcord was there. I knew where both of them of were the one for my main canopy on my right hip and the one for my reserve chute on the left side of my chest. Id practiced reaching for both of them hundreds of times. Id practiced reaching for them standing up in the summer sun. Id practiced lying across a table in a arch while instructors timed me against a stop watch. Id practiced while suspended from a harness in the hangar, being swung about by instructors simulating a malfunction. But on that first reach I couldnt seem to find it.

When a human being is extremely frightened when the mind perceives the situation to be one of fight-or-flight when your lizard brain starts telling your body hey we could die here in short, when youre scared absolutely shitless, a whole host of chemicals gets dumped into your body adrenalin and the like. There is a definite physical reaction to this: your heart rate accelerates, as does your breathing; you may forget to breathe entirely. You may freeze, or forget what you should be doing. You may suffer a deterioration of fine motor skills.

Which was exactly what was happening to me. Something that had seemed so routine finding the main ripcord was proving to be a struggle. As I flailed my right hand about, desperately seeking that ripcord, I felt the Jumpmasters hand grab mine and guide to the ripcord. Great, I thought, I really fucked that up.

I was at least able to make the last two practice touches without assistance. Then I checked again with both Jumpmasters, and got the ok each time. Still falling in a stable position. I checked my altitude still a little time left in free fall, but now all I had to do was fall a little further, wave-off, and pull.

So its understandable that I just about had a heart attack when I began to spin in a circle. What the hell is going on, I thought, this isnt part of the plan. Am I screwing up and making this happen? I looked to either side, expecting to see the pull immediately signal from one of the Jumpmasters, but there was nothing. They were acting like everything was cool, so I did likewise though I was shaking form the surprise. We went around a full 360, then stopped

I checked my altitude again. I had two altimeters, one strapped to my chest, one on my wrist. I didnt dare tilt my head down and possibly throw myself out of position, so I locked onto the dial on my wrist. The hand was spinning swiftly, like one of those madly turning clock images used in old movies to indicate the passage of time. 8000 feet. 7000 feet. 6000 feet.

As soon as the needle hit the 6000 mark, I waved off by crossing my hands in front of me twice, reached for the ripcord, arched as hard as I could and pulled. I looked over my left shoulder, watching the main canopy come out behind me. For a moment it hung in the air, a great ball of silk at the end of some strings. I was mentally urging it to open. Open!

The canopy opened and I came to a very abrupt halt. I looked above me and saw the most beautiful thing a lovely, square, fully opened main canopy. I had a bit of line twist at the top of the rigging, but as I reached up to grab the risers and twist out of it, they came untangled. Now I was sitting under a completely functional parachute. I wanted to hoot and holler. I wanted to giggle and clap my hands. I think I just dangled there with a big stupid grin on my face