The Perfectly Good Airplane

8/8/2019 The Perfectly Good Airplane

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in about 30 minutes from now? The pilot Joe was standing off to the side of the group and

two other jumpers watched Cal prepare – Barb and someone they called “Dead Bob”.

No, I did NOT want to know why he was called that. Another diver, John, fiddled with a

white helmet which had what appeared to be a small camera mounted on top.

The five of them looked up simultaneously and gawked at my approach. In retrospect I must

have looked a sight. It was early and I hadn’t slept. I stood now before them, hair wild, bug

eyed and spooked as though I’d just seen a ghost or was preparing to be one.

Again , why was I doing this?

I knew damned well why.

For as long as I can remember I have had this condition.

On the surface it may sound exciting and even valiant but I assure you it is not.

I am unable to say no whenever I am presented with an opportunity to grow.

It sounds very glorious and brave but really it is incredibly annoying and here’s why.

If a situation presents itself in which I will be forced to stretch beyond my comfort zone and

grow, a part of me instantly rises to the challenge to shout a resounding yes! Before I know it

I have committed to the activity which leads to my second condition – integrity bordering on

stupidity. If I commit to something, I have this infallible need to follow through, especially

if the only real reason for my desire to not do it is fear.



Damn!

And here’s the worst part:

Once I commit, the brave hero part of Nicole goes back into hibernation and the horrified

teeny weeny Nicole is left to pick up the pieces and meet the challenge head on.

Yippee.

And so here we were, with teeny weeny Nicole about to embark on a skyward journey of horror

in a very dubious looking Cessna with Dead Bob and four of his friends.

Great.

Things moved quickly in the next few minutes. After signing the “I promise to not to sue you if

you kill me” form, Cal gave me a brief overview of the ‘new revolutionary’ tandem skydive

equipment which, incidentally, had never before used in the Province of B.C. That is how I

ended up there in the first place. As a reporter for the daily tabloid in the province, my editor

had thought it’d be ‘neat’ to send his crazy rookie newbie reporter who happened to be

completely horrified of heights out for the first ever tandem skydive in British Columbia. And

of course ‘hero Nicole’ had agreed readily with the guy and here we were.

Yeah. Real neat.

It was time to get on the plane. Joe was already inside doing whatever it is pilots do

to prepare for taking off. I tentatively peered inside the small silver capsule.

“Um, where’s the rest of the plane,” I asked.





Clearly, it was because they are all insane.

Yes, that was it.

During what seemed to be the longest 20 minutes of my life, he also explained why he was

called Dead Bob.

He had lived through a horrible skydiving accident several years back. His parachute had

malfunctioned and so had his reserve chute. Miraculously, Bob had lived through everyone’s

worst nightmare to tell the tale.

“Going In” or “bouncing” is what the jumpers called it. Bob had fallen to earth from a

staggering 12 thousand feet and lived to tell the tale. Beyond getting to live, his award was his

name. Apparently, skydivers are given their own unique jumper nicknames based on what

horrors they lived through at the drop zone. I would have my own jumper name someday, but

we’ll get to that later in the story.

Dead Bob meanwhile sat before me, a series of still-visible scars covering much of his exposed

body as far as I could tell. This was probably not the best time to tell me this story, I decided.

But what he told me next was the strangest part of this tale. Apparently there were TWO

Dead Bobs and people numbered them to keep their identities straight. The man in this

airplane was Dead Bob One.

It had taken nearly 20 minutes to climb ‘to altitude’ – a staggering 10,000 feet above the safety



of solid ground. Ironically they told me that the higher we went, the safer it would be

because they had ‘more time’ if anything went wrong. Somehow this did not sell me fully on

the ‘higher is better’ idea. That extra time hadn’t helped Dead Bob One much.

Meanwhile, my terror level rose with every inch we climbed.

Every time I reached a level where I could not possibly get more afraid, I did. I had in fact

never known terror like this in my entire life. My mind screamed at me not to jump. The

negotiating and rationalizing had taken on new levels of insistence. At one point it even

pretended to be the voice of God.

“Nicole. This is God speaking. Do not do this today. I am here to tell you not to jump. You are

going to die! Yes, this is the sign you've been waiting for. Turn baa-aack….”

Suddenly, it was time to jump.

The small airplane door was flung open to invite the roaring wind.

“Well, that’s just wrong,” my mind yelled over the noise.

At this point I became acutely aware of the fact that I was the only occupant of the airplane –

pilot included – who was not wearing a parachute. I sat on my knees sporting a red sky dive

jumpsuit and a ‘tandem harness’. Without being tethered to the man wearing the tandem rig,

this device would be as life saving as a piece of dental floss. Sure, I’d have lower instances

of gingivitis but, sheesh, I’d be dead (or Dead Nicole One).





We stood on a smaller metal bar called the strut. Ironically, I did not feel like strutting.

I blankly observed all the other jumpers climb out of the airplane after us, clinging to plane at

various angles. The ‘camera man’ positioned himself to capture every moment of my glorious

earth-bound plummet, screams and all.

Cal was shouting in my ear again – something about letting go.

Well that would just be silly.

But that was what it was time to do. Let go.

In our 10 minutes of ground training I was shown the letting go position. My feet would leave

the security of the strut and bend backwards between Cal’s legs. My head would tilt backward

to avoid colliding with the strut when we dropped. And my arms would let go of their death

grip on the plane and appropriately be crossed over my chest in a corpse like manner.

Letting go.

I knew for sure in that moment that I could not let go. And then I did.

The first thing I noticed was the sensation of falling. Everyone tells you there is no feeling of

falling when you skydive which is true except for the first six seconds during which you

accelerate from zero to one hundred and twenty miles per hour and believe me you feel it!

Don't let anyone tell you any different.



After the first six seconds of careening straight down, the stomach-in-mouth situation

dissipated, leaving way to on odd floating sensation. It was then that I thought I heard a long

wailing male scream. It was much later that I realized it was the wind, and not Cal yelling in

my ear because things had gone horribly wrong.

Moments later, I noticed superman flying in front of me.

He was wearing a camera on his head.

“Smile for the camera,” I thought blankly, and did.

I found myself settling into this new surreal environment, as best one could when they

were doing a hundred and twenty straight down, that is.

Suddenly we lurched to a dead stop.

Dangling like dead puppets beneath the parachute strings, my mind scrambled to comprehend

this latest development. The wailing had stopped and it was deathly quiet. A

sound similar to ripping silk broke the silence and my stomach was yet again inside my mouth.

As Cal pulled the parachute toggles off the Velcro holders, he spoke.

“Woohoo – what a ride!”

I nearly jumped out of my skin at the sound of his voice.

I’d actually forgotten he was there.



I took my first real breath of the day.

The freefall was done, the parachute was open and it appeared as though we were going

to live through this thing after all.

I relaxed a little more and noticed my new surroundings for the first time. I was dangling in

mid-air beneath a rectangle of bubbling silk. Rays of morning sun were poking over the

wall of mountain peaks to the East and the hazy morning blue sky beamed a golden hue over

the breathtaking farmland mosaic 4,500 feet below us.

And I was going to live! It was truly beautiful.

I can’t remember what we talked about as Cal and I floated down to solid ground but I know

we chatted non-stop throughout the seven minute ride.

Finally, we landed unceremoniously in a heap on the ground and the adventure was over.

For now.

I returned to the drop zone later that year to do a 2nd

tandem jump ‘just for fun’.

Surprisingly, I lived again and decided it was time for an even bigger challenge.

I tried my own solo jump, and then another and another.

After 16 solo jumps and my own freefall dive, it turned out to be one hell of

a summer.

During my ‘skydiving days’ I lived through many minor goof ups and earned a



nickname of my own: Sister Step Face . As amusing as that tale is, I think

I'll leave the details of that mishap to your imagination, dear reader.

By far, the most important thing I received that summer was the

Solid belief that I could face nearly anything, no matter how

huge, and most likely live.

All I had to do was let go.

THE END?

Cal and Nicole freefalling over Chilliwack B.C. 1986

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The Perfectly Good Airplane