The frightening consequences of electroshock therapy
I'm a middle aged government attorney living in a rural section of the northeast U.S. I'm unmarried and come from a very large family. When not preoccupied with family and my job, I read enormous amounts, toy with evolutionary theory, and scratch various parts on my body.
This journal is filled with an enormous number of half-truths and outright lies, including this sentence.
My two mile trip (with pics)
Made the decision on Friday. I'm only 5 lbs over their weight limit, and I did not want to wait until summer was over. It was supposed to be cloudy Saturday, but the guy convinced me to come anyway. I think he wanted to get my money before I chickened out.
It was about a seventy mile drive out to where I had to go, in relatively flat area amidst some Amish farming country. As I came close, I saw a farmer plowing his field using a team of six horses, and a woman and her daughter dressed in clothing that went out of style over a century ago.
The "airport" was just a long paved strip, maybe twice as wide as typical driveway and a few football fields in length. The "hanger" was a converted barn.
I pulled in. They made me watch a video that had a guy with a beard that went to his bellybutton talking about the release of liability I was required to sign before I jumped. Then I signed four pages of releases that freed the parachute manufacturer and the skydiving place from all liability if anything went wrong, even if they deliberately made things go wrong. In fact, if I or my heirs were to sue, the owners of the skydiving place would get $25,000.00 (yeah. right. I'm sure that is enforceable). If I were the sort to chicken out, the stuff about loss of life and limb would have done it.
So then I got into this colorful jumpsuit and hat that made me look like a clown. This dude named Fritz, who actually runs a bar when he is not doing this, was my tandem partner. Basically, I was to be strapped to the front of him while he actually got the parachute to work. He went over the instructions for when we reached 10,000 feet. Pretty simple. Kneel while he strapped me in, go to the door when given the signal, hold my arms in when we jumped, and then spred them out and arch my back after we started falling. At the landing, I had to pull up my legs unless otherwise told.
We watched another set of parachutists come down, while I petted the conveniently supplied, friendly house cats.
So then we hopped into this very small plane and off we went. I paid an extra 70 dollars to have a cameraman jump with us and tape everything.
Despite the prior day's weather prediction, it was a gorgeous day, with small white puffy clouds interrupting an otherwise perfectly blue sky. Up we went, and soon the fields below us became checkerboard spots. The skydiving place is situated on a twenty mile stretch of land sitting between two long skinny lakes, and up a few thousand feet both lakes and a few others in the distance were visible. Down below, the sailboats were like small flecks of white.
At around 9,000 feet I started feeling a little nervous. I'm not certain why, but the impact of the height just hit me a tiny a bit. I told the guy who was hooking me up that it was more the fear of being afraid when we first got out under the wing.
For the most part, I have very little fear of heights. I can remember climbing to the top of the refrigerator in my house when I was three and everyone applauding me, and I wonder if perhaps my subsequent enjoyment of heights stems from that incident. I spent a lot of youth climbing trees and the steep embankments of the gorges near my home. Jumping off the first story roof of my house was something my brothers and I would do to show how cool we were. During college, some friends and I scaled the outside of a few buildings.
So we reached our target height, with some wispy clouds below us blocking an otherwise amazing view of lakes, fields, and forests. The guy with the camera crawled out first, and then we sat on the edge of the plane. He plunged off and then we went. Just falling off the edge and down into the clouds. I really didn't have time to feel afraid.
The first couple of seconds of freefall made my stomach nauseous, and I wondered whether this was such a good idea of after all. We were plunging head first intitially, and then we went horizontal.
I looked for the camera guy, but he was way behind us. After a few more seconds of plunging down, my tandem partner pulled the cord and the parachute came out.
Then it was a quick drift downwards. The parachute had a wing-like design, and by pulling and shifting his weight my tandem partner could direct our fall. Down below my feet, the fields grew larger. We passed a couple hundred feet over the barn where the planes are stored and angled towards the landing area. The ground came up pretty quickly, but it wasn't overly alarming. Finally, we skidded in for a landing. I stood up, laughing, and shook my tandem partner's hand, and then headed in to get rid of my gear.
I guess I would rate this up there with experiencing the eclipse in 1994. Unique and strange, and over with much more quickly than I would have liked. It was a lot easier and less scary than I anticipated, which was in some ways disappointing. Still, I'm glad I did this. When I looked at the clouds today, I could remember what it felt like to plummet down from them, and the distance acquired a new significance for me.
It was about a seventy mile drive out to where I had to go, in relatively flat area amidst some Amish farming country. As I came close, I saw a farmer plowing his field using a team of six horses, and a woman and her daughter dressed in clothing that went out of style over a century ago.
The "airport" was just a long paved strip, maybe twice as wide as typical driveway and a few football fields in length. The "hanger" was a converted barn.
I pulled in. They made me watch a video that had a guy with a beard that went to his bellybutton talking about the release of liability I was required to sign before I jumped. Then I signed four pages of releases that freed the parachute manufacturer and the skydiving place from all liability if anything went wrong, even if they deliberately made things go wrong. In fact, if I or my heirs were to sue, the owners of the skydiving place would get $25,000.00 (yeah. right. I'm sure that is enforceable). If I were the sort to chicken out, the stuff about loss of life and limb would have done it.
So then I got into this colorful jumpsuit and hat that made me look like a clown. This dude named Fritz, who actually runs a bar when he is not doing this, was my tandem partner. Basically, I was to be strapped to the front of him while he actually got the parachute to work. He went over the instructions for when we reached 10,000 feet. Pretty simple. Kneel while he strapped me in, go to the door when given the signal, hold my arms in when we jumped, and then spred them out and arch my back after we started falling. At the landing, I had to pull up my legs unless otherwise told.
We watched another set of parachutists come down, while I petted the conveniently supplied, friendly house cats.
So then we hopped into this very small plane and off we went. I paid an extra 70 dollars to have a cameraman jump with us and tape everything.
Despite the prior day's weather prediction, it was a gorgeous day, with small white puffy clouds interrupting an otherwise perfectly blue sky. Up we went, and soon the fields below us became checkerboard spots. The skydiving place is situated on a twenty mile stretch of land sitting between two long skinny lakes, and up a few thousand feet both lakes and a few others in the distance were visible. Down below, the sailboats were like small flecks of white.
At around 9,000 feet I started feeling a little nervous. I'm not certain why, but the impact of the height just hit me a tiny a bit. I told the guy who was hooking me up that it was more the fear of being afraid when we first got out under the wing.
For the most part, I have very little fear of heights. I can remember climbing to the top of the refrigerator in my house when I was three and everyone applauding me, and I wonder if perhaps my subsequent enjoyment of heights stems from that incident. I spent a lot of youth climbing trees and the steep embankments of the gorges near my home. Jumping off the first story roof of my house was something my brothers and I would do to show how cool we were. During college, some friends and I scaled the outside of a few buildings.
So we reached our target height, with some wispy clouds below us blocking an otherwise amazing view of lakes, fields, and forests. The guy with the camera crawled out first, and then we sat on the edge of the plane. He plunged off and then we went. Just falling off the edge and down into the clouds. I really didn't have time to feel afraid.
The first couple of seconds of freefall made my stomach nauseous, and I wondered whether this was such a good idea of after all. We were plunging head first intitially, and then we went horizontal.
I looked for the camera guy, but he was way behind us. After a few more seconds of plunging down, my tandem partner pulled the cord and the parachute came out.
Then it was a quick drift downwards. The parachute had a wing-like design, and by pulling and shifting his weight my tandem partner could direct our fall. Down below my feet, the fields grew larger. We passed a couple hundred feet over the barn where the planes are stored and angled towards the landing area. The ground came up pretty quickly, but it wasn't overly alarming. Finally, we skidded in for a landing. I stood up, laughing, and shook my tandem partner's hand, and then headed in to get rid of my gear.
I guess I would rate this up there with experiencing the eclipse in 1994. Unique and strange, and over with much more quickly than I would have liked. It was a lot easier and less scary than I anticipated, which was in some ways disappointing. Still, I'm glad I did this. When I looked at the clouds today, I could remember what it felt like to plummet down from them, and the distance acquired a new significance for me.
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