I guess when you’ve been stripped of almost everything you’ve known about yourself for the past 25 years, there is some freedom in sort of re-creating yourself. I mean, really what choice do you have? Might as well have some fun and do some shit your former self would never have done. What do you have to lose? It is liberating to start with a clean slate.

Part of my emancipation from former self, if you will, came from our move. The sale of the house we had lived in for 13 years and leaving the place I had lived for 27 years brought a fresh start. I wasn’t running from my former life, I just felt the deep down need for a change. Call it a mid-life crisis if you must, but I simply could not breathe anymore.

And for a while, everything was rosy. The sale of our house brought some welcomed financial relief and we met some truly great people. I met friends who enjoyed the same hobbies I do and our lifestyle went from the big city of 4 million to a small town of 4,000 people, and a ranch that we love. This is a horse community and it feeds our souls. So really the change began there.

The Airplane Part…..

On to the airplanes! My daughter turned 18 here, in our new house, she chose to spend her senior year in our new town at a new school. Talk about re-inventing yourself! She is a true badass.

And so true to her nature, for her 18th birthday… she wanted to go skydiving. My response? “Fuck it. I’m in!” With my new-found devil-may-care attitude, I set out to research sky-diving opportunities in our area. Found a great one 45 minutes out and off we went!

Now, I am up for a roller coaster any time. Off to Six Flags? Magic Mountain? I’m your girl. Skydiving, however, as I came to find out, is a little different.

We got through the video and signing our life away, basically the we WILL NOT SUE under any circumstances, even if your chute-doesn’t-open papers. Let the palm-sweats begin.

Losing Muscular Control….

As we get strapped on to our partner, who by the way, resembled a lone hiker near the end Pacific Crest Trail, and unfortunately smelled like it too. We’ll call him Wade. But that’s neither here nor there. Mia’s eyes were dilated with excitement. She had a shit-eating perma-grin on her face.

No me, my knees began to shake. Involuntarily. Like, I truly had ZERO control over my muscles.

We began the death march to the aluminum coffin—I mean ‘aircraft’—while Wade’s musk of Mountain Man & Regret wafted beside me.

That’s when the racing thoughts flooded my mind…I had no control over those either.

Terrifying Thoughts….

They were coming at me like the train in Speed with Keanu Reeves:

• What IF the parachute doesn’t open?
• What IF I detach from Wade?
• What if we get blown off course? We ARE on the coast, what if we land in the water?
• AND THEN THE MOST TERRIFYING THOUGHT….I am jumping first (it’s just the way we are positioned in the plane) what if something happens to Mia? There will be absolutely NOTHING I can do to save her, all strapped to Gary and everything.
• What if Mia’s parachute doesn’t deploy? All I would be able to do is watch her plummet!

As I sat frozen, except for my legs which had a complete mind of their own at this point, the “solo” jumpers tumbled out of the plane one by one… disappearing down below. IDIOTS! Who does this for fun??

And Then We Were Falling…

Somewhere between nearly peeing my pants and feeling positive this was the last time I’d see my kid alive, we jumped out of the airplane. And we were gliding…. it wasn’t the drop of a rollercoaster, but much more peaceful. Honestly, the free fall before the chute opened up was the most peaceful part. And it occurred to me that this is life as I know it now. Terror into an unexpected peaceful free fall, then yanked sharply by the chute deploying (thank god!).

And then Wade decided to get a little fancy and start the spinning. Laughing maniacally as we spun faster and faster. I could feel the color leaving my face and my breakfast coming up. Was it not enough that we had just JUMPED OUT OF AN AIRPLANE??? Also symbolic of life as I know it. Just when you think you can relax for a moment, the Universe cackles and sends you spinning out of control.

Easy, Wade. You wanna scrub my breakfast out of your Patagonia, or should I just projectile it now and save us both the suspense?

Once the spinning subsided, my focus turned to the landing. Will I break both legs? Will I face-skate across the sand lot?

Shockingly no. We landed just fine. And Mia followed, gliding in behind us, begging like her two-year-old self, “I want to jump again!!”

Not me, I want a margarita.