Skydiving Adventures - Part 1

I'd like to introduce you to Carla. Today's birthday girl to whom I dedicate this post. In honor of Carla's special day, I've decided to post about our skydiving adventure that took place Sept. 2009.

Ever known anyone in their right mind who wanted to do this? Me either. That's what I told Carla and Angelia last fall when they asked me if I was interested. Why would anyone in their right mind jump out of a perfectly good airplane? They were going with a group, so would get a group rate and continued.... "If you're going to do it, now is the time. It won't cost as much." "No thanks," I replied and I thought I meant it. I did pull up the Skydive Utah website and look at it briefly to see just what they were getting into. A day or so later while shopping at Harmons there was a good looking guy with a Skydive Utah Staff shirt on. He was behind me in the checkout line. Hmmmm.

Doris said, "Do you work there?"

He said "Yes."

Doris said, "I need to talk to you. My neices are trying to talk me into going this weekend."

He said, "You should definitely go."

Doris said, "Okay, here's the deal. I'm afraid of breaking my legs or ankles and I have marathons to run."

He said, "If you come, I will personally go with you. I've jumped over 1000 times and never had anyone get hurt. I will personally pay you $1000 if you do."

Doris thought... he's good looking, and looks strong. Not some little scrawney wimp.

Doris said, "Really? What's your name?"

He said, "Tyler"

Doris said, "I'll think about it."

He said, "See you Saturday."

Doris said, "Okay, I'll think about it"

All of the sudden this skydiving thing seemed like an okay thing to do. Was my thought process clouded (hmmm nice choice of word here) because he was strong, good looking and blah blah blah. Likely. I made a reservation the next day with a special condition, that Tyler be my tandem buddy.

Fast forward to Saturday. The day. Thoughts had gone into will and testament preparation by this point. Okay more than that, I had actually written something down. Angelia, Carla, Jeff and I all headed to Erda. When we arrived they had us watch a video. What I remember now was it talked about 3 B's. Breathe, Banana, and Belly Button. Pretty much the bottom line was

1. Breathe. Don't forget to breathe. It can be like sucking on a fire hose if you do it through your mouth so be sure to breathe through your nose.

2. Banana. Your body needs to be in the shape of a banana. Kick your feet toward your bum.

3. Belly Button. Point your belly button toward the ground.

After this instruction we did a lot of watching on the tarmack. It looked like this:

We would watch for a while and then you would see people dropping out of the sky like this.

And then Doris's stomach knotted up.

Next they came and said okay, let's get you set-up with your harness and a little more instruction. Stay tuned...