In Which JJ Gets Her A License

My A license stamp! Ordinarily it would be on my forehead, but I lucked out.

After two long years (with a 10 month hiatus in between), Bear and I have received our A licenses at last. It’s been a long journey, but completely and utterly worth it.

Skydivers are a curious breed. To call us adrenaline junkies would be over-simplification; of course, we are adrenaline junkies. Not many people would willingly throw themselves out of a plane two and a half miles above the earth. Over and over again. But the thrill of falling through the skies, of possibly getting one step closer to death—that fades within two or three jumps. Jumping is only really and truly scary the first time.

True danger lies in being complacent. When you’re complacent, you are less vigilant. When you are less vigilant, you allow more room for stupid mistakes. When you allow room for stupid mistakes, you may get injured—or worse, you may die.

What keeps us jumping? I have no idea. You can ask each and every one of us why we do it and you’ll get a different answer, but skydivers really are a certain breed of people. There’s something common to each of us that keeps us jumping and I’m not sure how to articulate it.

Only a small percentage of the human population would willingly allow themselves to be flung out of an airplane high above the earth with nothing but the vague hope that the parachute will save them. Of that small percentage, an even smaller number return to do it again and again. We joke and we josh and we tell each other that it’s like having a cocaine habit (…a cocaine habit may in fact be cheaper). The ridiculous things we have each done for this sport—for “one more hit”—are stories we tell when the beer light goes on the hangar and the sunset load is about to swoop the pond.

To date, the “ridiculous” things I have done for this sport include:

1. Calling in “sick” to work on a Wednesday to do my second and third tandems. Bear and I had gone down every weekend to the DZ to complete them, but every weekend it was pouring rain or completely overcast and therefore entirely unjumpable. (Thus began JJ’s long and antagonistic relationship with the weather.) I watched Weather.com like a hawk, saw the middle of the week was clear, and jumped for that hole.
2. Finding two random strangers to drive me down to the DZ while Bear was on a road trip to California. Bear and I managed to get most of our student jumps done quickly, but high winds on Memorial Day prevented us from graduating. Soon after, Bear was gone for a month to California and I was stranded in New York City without a ride. I met Ken and Derek, the loveliest couple ever, at a bar in Brooklyn. They had a car. I convinced them to go skydiving.

I relayed these stories to another skydiver on the ride up to altitude on my checkout dive and he threw his head back and laughed.

“Yep, that’s a true skydiver, right there,” he said.

Is that what makes a true skydiver? The willingness to do whatever it takes for that next hit?

For all that we liken our sport to an addiction (“nylon crack” is the phrase I prefer), I posit that it’s actually an anti-drug. Users often do drugs to “forget,” to slip into oblivion, to allow themselves to be overtaken by a haze. Before you cry “conservative foul!” on me, I’m all for the recreational use of drugs. Sometimes, it’s fun to lower your inhibitions. What’s alcohol but a drug anyway? But lower your inhibitions on a skydive and you’re a danger to yourself and to others. This will probably end up with your banishment from the dropzone.

Adrenaline sharpens our senses. It gives us control in high-stress situations. Skydiving, more often than not, is about control. Awareness of your body in flight gives you control over your freefall. Awareness of wind direction, strength, how it changes over different types of terrain, etc. gives you control under canopy. Understanding the physics of the canopy, experimentation with how it recovers from radical moves, etc. gives you control on how you land. This is, in many ways, an exceedingly mental sport.

Yet, we are some of the most laid-back people in the world. Perhaps you have to be, to keep cool in high-stress situations. Our relaxed personalities also make for great communities. Bear and I have been to our dropzone so many times when we haven’t been able to jump, but we’ve never minded too terribly. It’s fun to hang out. The best part is, even if you aren’t best friends with everyone there, you know that they’re always looking out for you, always making sure you’re safe, and always willing to teach. I do the same for any other skydiver “less” experienced than I. We all love to talk and teach and learn.

Oh, and another strange and curious fact about us skydivers?

More than a few of us are actually terrified of heights. (Myself included.)

Go figure, eh?

I will give a full-accounting of the A license checkout dive once I get my video. Will also give a full-accounting of how hilariously Bear and I didn’t accomplish our first 2-way. We are heading to the DZ tomorrow to see if we can’t work on some linked exits and getting level on our jumps. I may need to invest in a weight belt.

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