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= F.U.C.K. - Fucked Up College Kids - Born Jan. 24th, 1993 - F.U.C.K. =
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Suicide and Airplanes: Jumping
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I tried to kill myself when I was 21 years old. Whatever. Rough childhood
and all that. Anyway, I've been doing things that are a little dangerous
just about my whole life. Most people think I'm crazy. Or I'm a little
on the edge. In high school I was known as satan. Not that you give a
shit about any of that but it's nice to have a little background.
I went to college in NY where I crossed a 3 mile long railroad bridge one
night with my roommate. It's famous now. It's in a bunch of railroad
magazines; the first railroad bridge to span the Hudson River. They're
rebuilding it into a walkway now. A monument of sorts. No big deal eh?
Did I mention that it's about 300' above ground? Oh yeah, it was condemned
after a fire in 1929? or there about. We crawled for about half the total
distance on a 12" wide I-beam. Very exciting shit. Maybe I'll write about
that someday . . .
Anyway, that wasn't exciting enough. I decided to start train dodging.
Now that's an adrenaline pumper. Picture yourself standing in the middle of
three sets of railroad tracks. There's a small but stiff breeze. Down the
line you can see a small pimple of a light. You figure out which track the
train is on and move to it. You stand solidly in the middle of the two iron
bars. Throwing back the last of a beer, you grin and toss the can aside.
The echo of the empty tin can booms in your ears. Slowly the light gets
larger.
Larger . . . more intense. It blinds you. The thunder of the train can be
heard now. It's less than a mile away. The light is right in front of you.
Day blossoms around you.
Pounding, pounding, pounding.
Your breath catches in your throat. What would happen if you just didn't
jump. What would everyone think then? Still no one would know. They would
know nothing. So you prepare to jump.
100 yards, 80 yards, 40 yards. The rattle of the cars can be heard against
the constant background noise of steel on steel. For all intents and
purposes a million tons of steel comes barreling at you. Constrained only
by two insignificant steel bands.
Your roommate jumps off. You stare into the light.
This is what a deer feels like. Immobilized your mind races faster than
your heart. At 40' your roommate screams at you. His voice just barely
audible over the cacophony of noise created by the beast that is baring down
on you.
30' and a solid force slams into your side. You fall to the gravel bed.
Rocks driving into your wrists: knees pounding into the wood of the tracks
next to you.
As you lay bruised on the cold rocky ground a gale washes over you; sweeping
away the adrenaline as a cold shower washes away the pain of sunburn.
We used to do that a lot. Then my roommate got tired of tackling me. He
began to hate me I think. Shit, if I had to save some idiot every night
I'd grow to loath them too. Later on in my college career I tried it for
real. I lost everything but my life: In a sense I even lost that.
After they let me out of the hospital I left the state for greener pastures
and bluer skies. It was a good decision. It was time for change.
Well, I toned my life down a bit. Instead of drinking myself into oblivion
night after night I started writing; I only drink on the weekends now. That
is, I try only to drink on the weekends.
After a few months of being normal I got tired of it all. I lost my suicidal
edge to an extent. But I still had a craving to give my adrenal gland a
workout. So I decided to jump out of a plane.
My roommate Scott and I decided that we'd jump. He's totally normal so I
was shocked that he had an interest at all. Not that you have to be abnormal
to jump out of a totally stable aircraft.
So, we set up a date to do it and drove out to the airport. It was the
smallest airport I've ever seen in my life. I thought it was a farm. It
was comprised of a large barn and a dirt parking lot. Along side the barn
was a small trailer. Just past the trailer was the worlds smallest runway.
It was either a runway or a long stretch of crabgrass. Hard to tell
actually. Remembering back on it I think it was just a small patch of
crabgrass gone wild.
We headed out into the trailer where we signed our lives away and promised
that if we died no one would sue them for it. They were to be held
responsible for nothing. No matter what. Fine by me.
We were led into another room where we where taught the basics of arching
and turning and when to grab the toggles and what to do with them. We
weren't doing it solo. We were going tandem. What that entails is that
there's someone behind you that you're strapped to at the shoulders and
the waist.
We suited up, complete with goggles and Greg Bradey-type pants. At that
point in time I'm sure we could have scored with any chick in the world.
We even got a cap to go along with our new nifty duds.
Anyway, we met the guys that were to be our tandem counterparts. The guy
I was with was about 6'4" and skinny as a rail. Probably even thinner than
I and that's a feat. His name was Paul. We loaded up in the plane. Our
tandem partners explaining over again what the scenario was to be. Paul
was silent. I listened to Scott's partner.
We'll be jumping out at 14,000'. We'll be free-falling for a total of two
minutes. Fall out of the plane. Forward. Arch. Because the two of us will
have a higher mass I'll let out a small chute to keep us at the same terminal
velocity that a single jumper would have. When I tap you on the right
shoulder spin right. Tap again. Stop. When I tap you on the left shoulder
spin left. Tap again. Stop. Check your altimeter. At 6,000' we pull the
chute. You let me know that you're aware of when that is. When I tap you
again hold yourself and I'll let out the shoot. Then stand on my feet and
I'll unhook you at the waist. You'll swing down, connected only at the
shoulders. Don't worry the harnesses are built to hold a weight of 1 ton.
And you don't weigh that much.
So with that out of the way we're bounding along the grass runway. I was
in the front seated on the floor next to the pilot. My Paul was seated
behind me. If I were gay I would have liked that compromising position.
I'm not, and I wished to god that he wasn't either. I watched the pilot
defy the laws of gravity. We were tossed up and down, side to side by the
gale winds. I looked over at Scotty. He looked a bit scared. He kept
staring at me. Trying to tell me something with his eyes. (Later I found
out that he was big-eyed because the girl next to him was so hot. I was
enjoying the whole experience so much I didn't even notice that half the
plane was filled with females.)
Paul and this other guy started talking about how it was so tragic the guy
last week had come unattached from Paul's harness and died in the fields
below. Maybe they shouldn't have drank that night they say. "Oh yeah,"
Paul says to this other jumper, "which pill was I supposed to take?" "The
red one." "Shit," Paul says shaking his head back and forth, "I took the
blue ones again."
At 8,000' we all got buddy buddy with our tandem partner and got latched
together. They double checked all four points of contact. Both shoulders
and hips.
"Ok, throw 'em out," the pilot said, smiling at Paul.
So, two by two, everyone made their way to the back door. Which, by the
by, was a solid sheet of plexiglass. Very cool. You could see for miles
out of that door. I'm blind so I couldn't tell the difference between the
grass, the fields, or the forests and lakes but it was enrapturing
none-the-less. As I made it towards the door Paul checked the straps of
the harness. When he was satisfied he pushed me closer to the door. The
sound of the wind buffeting past the plane was deafening. Everyone had
jumped but us.
"You're friend said that you're nuts," he told me. "Are you," he half-asked.
"Uh, I don't know. I guess you could say that I'm not right," I told him
blandly.
"Ok, forget what they told you down there. We're going to roll out of this
plane."
"Uh . . .," I half replied.
"Just tuck your head between your legs and roll. Keep trying to kiss your
ass until I tap you. Then arch.
With that he called out, "One . . . two." And out we went. No three. No
fucking three.
I tucked my head between my ass. The world spun by then the sky then the
world. World, sky, world, sky. Blue, green, bluegreen, bluegreen. My
mind receded in upon itself. I was whole: I was alive and I plummeted
towards death.
>From out of the spinning blue and green came a pounding on my back. The
wind made it impossible to hear. We had reached a higher terminal velocity
than normal . . . he hadn't let out the safety shoot yet. We were still
free falling.
I arched. Immediately we leveled out and stopped spinning. In front of us
the plane dove and swung up under us. We fell towards it and swiftly it was
under us and away. It was gone out of my line of vision in a split second.
I enjoyed the speed. My mind raced quicker than my body. Ecstasy consumed
my very being. We spun right then straightened out. We spun left and
straightened out. I looked at my altimeter, 8,000'. God this was
intense! We spun in a left circle for what seemed like an hour.
We rolled once and then arched again. I interpreted his nudges and assumed
I did the right thing because he threw up two thumbs in front of my face and
shook them. I looked at my altimeter, 4,000'.
Then he tapped me again. I held myself. Suddenly I was jerked out of my
free-fall. The chute opened. He reached down and pulled my goggles off
my eyes. He screamed in triumph/joy/ecstasy/fear/relief. I joined him.
I got on his feet and he undid the clasps at my waist. Then he told me
to get off his feet. For two seconds I thought I was going to fall the
rest of the way. But after a mere 2" my shoulder straps took hold and my
weight was nestled by the harness once again. He handed me the toggles
and we proceeded to do spirals left and right, testing the chute.
Everything was ok so we started fucking around a bit. All the while he
was laughing and screaming. We did a 720 degree turn that brought our
bodies up even with the top of the chute. It was tremendous.
We settled down and watched the others who had jumped before us land.
Then Paul said that we had to prepare to land. All I had to do was pull
down as hard as I could on the toggles seconds before my feet touched the
ground. He said that if we came in too fast that I should just raise my
legs up and hit with my ass.
We practiced in the air. We both pulled down on the toggles and for half
a second Mother Nature was defeated. We hung motionless in the air.
Neither going up nor going down. It was the most surreal feeling I've
had in my entire life. There is no drug that I've found to duplicate
that feeling. It was almost as intense as plummeting down through the
skies staring at the massiveness of earth.
When we landed on the pad I unclasped from Paul, shook his hand, and
tackled Scotty.
The Unbidden
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