How did you start skydiving?

[Magistr8 0]

This came up at the DZ over the weekend and I heard some pretty funny ones. ( Dave, yours really gets me ) Post how you started skydiving, it WILL be fun.

I'll go first:
It was Aug 10th 2001 and some friends and I decided it would be a good idea to go skydiving on the way to our camping trip. 3 of us went, I was the only one to keep comming back.

[CrazyIvan 0]

I wanted to become a skydiver for YEARS, but there was always something, like, not enough time, or money or both, so, about 1 year ago, I had the time AND the money, I went for a tandem...the rest is history.

__________________________________________
Blue Skies and May the Force be with you.

[jessd 0]

My dad talked me into going to do a tandem last summer. He always wanted to try it and he didn't want to go alone. So, we went as a way to celebrate his 45th b-day last August.

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away..."

[Brains 2]

A girl i was dating had seen a video of her stepmother doing a tandem and said she had always wanted to do that. I took her for her birthday and i figured i would jump also. I showed up the next weekend for two more tandems and then paid for all of my AFF training up front. Oh yeah, her, i cut her away a while back.

Never look down on someone, unless they are going down on you.

[ladyskydiver 0]

I'd always wanted to do 1 skydive, mark it off my list of things to do before I died, and move on to the next thing. Sep. 2000 did my first jump and knew that I'd never mark it off my list of things to do.

Life is short! Break the rules! Forgive quickly! Kiss slowly! Love truly, Laugh uncontrollably. And never regret anything that made you smile.

[CrazyIvan 0]

Quote

i cut her away a while back.

Do you have a 'reserve'?

__________________________________________
Blue Skies and May the Force be with you.

[jlmiracle 7]

1996, the movie Drop Zone was on HBO alot. I had my 10 year high school reunion coming up and I got a bug up my ass about doing something exciting. I went to work to find out there were a few people there interested in jumping.

July 21, 1996 I made my first AFF (never did a tandem til jump 550) and didn't really like it to much. I felt a little nauseous on opening and thought thank god I stopped moving. One of the other girls I was with had such a good time, I figured I missed something on that first jump so I did level 2, became addicted and the rest is history.

Judy

Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

[mac266 0]

myself and 5 friends decided to give it a go (i had always wanted to) when it came to the cash deposit everyone pulled out bar me! - did my first jump and then sat in the pub with everyone on my SL course and EVERYONE said how they will be back next week........... they never did! i continued and met some of the best people ever! - 3 years later i now have found a "new" passion - and have met even more great people!

Live your dreams and phuk everyone else holding you back!!

[Keith 0]

I was just going to do one tandem for the hell of it. Once out the door, I knew I'd be jumping for the rest of my life.

Keith

Don't Fuck with me Keith - J. Mandeville

[DTOXX 0]

A friend and I had talked about it for years. He was going to Oregon to visit some friends, one of whom was a skydiver. I thought I would be damned if I let him go without me so while he was out of state I drove my sorry ass to the DZ and did my AFF1.

I do believe the minute he returned he called me to look at HIS video. I put MY video in may pocket (cargo shorts are the best) and when over. He had no idea I went at this point. He started the VCR and began to explain everything about it. I said to be quite and let me just see it first, then he could talk all he wants. When he got up to rewind the video I pulled MY tape out and told him to "pop this in".

We both continued our AFF course and coaching jumps until a medical situation made it impossible for him to jump.

This weekend I am going to ruin another good friends life by taking him to the DZ for his first jump. (tandem)

-------
D.T. Holder
SIMstudy

[redtwiga 0]

My boss ended up travelling on his honeymoon for 8 months and left me running his company. It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, since I really didn't have the experience for it. When he got back, instead of a bonus, he got me a first jump course and two static line jumps. The weekend I went to cash them in, I camped out and did 5 jumps.

[Tasadin 0]

Went for a SL jump over a weekend in 93 did two and then did nuffin til may 02. I then did 8 SL jumps with the RAF, and wanted to go away and do AFF with the then GF but couldnt afford it for both of us. Well 9 months later we split for other reasons. I applied for a new CC and overdraft to do some retail therapy and suddenly thought ahah!!! Hmm how much to go to Fl and jump and do AFF. Found out how much got on the jumbo and the rest is history I'm now 50 jumps better off. Whilst I wouldnt have wished for the split and we are still mates now it was the best thing she ever made me do unintentionally - I have to thank her for that

"If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough."

[pd190 0]

I started after MFF school (came with the job.) I didn't actually know how much fun could be had in the sky. Back then it was put your ruck on, sit on the plane, button up your O2, stand up, fall out, flat and happy with no turns, please don't touch anybody, and stay 50 m hort. and vert seperation from everyone under canopy.

Then I met another skydiver who took me under his wing and coached me for about 25 jumps. Now I consider myself to be a fun, safe, and all-around decent skydiver. (RW, Vid work, and working on some CrW this summer!, tandem course is right around the corner.)

[Brains 2]

Quote

Quote

i cut her away a while back.

Do you have a 'reserve'?

NOPE

Never look down on someone, unless they are going down on you.

[beemertec 0]

May of last year I got a wild hair and decided I wanted to try skydiving. I lined up 15 friends and coworkers that wanted to and set up AFF level 1 for all of us the 1st Sat. in June. By that morning we were down to 7 people. Out of the 7 a few of them have made 1 or 2 more jumps, and most of them keep saying they are coming back again. (I'll believe it when I see it.) I was the only 1 that stuck with it. I graduated AFF a week later, and bought my gear 1 month after that. I don't understand how people can make 1 jump and just walk away.

Blue Skies
Steve
Ok, so it's pink, but I'm secure in my manhood, and I still look cool coming in under it!

[monarch135 0]

watching a falling star

[aufreefly 0]

I used to be in the Navy. One of my friends was reenlisting and he paid for 10 of us to go and do tandems. He signed the papers in the plane and we skydived all afternoon. Two of us came back the next weekend and took the first jump course. Three years later here I am!

[froglady 0]

I'd said I always wanted to try it. So my husband got me one for my 30th birthday. Went with a group of friends, we are the only 2 still jumping, and have a bunch of new friends. During the 1st year we jumped we could only afford 1 rig, we would meet each other at the peas and grab the rig to pack, so we could have our turn.

FrogLady

[Magistr8 0]

After reading all these so far, it seems like everyone who tried it and stuck with it, new right off the wing that they would be hooked.

Every jump keeps us comming back for more

[Skymonkey13 0]

I have always loved to fly in planes but have always been deathly scared of landing in planes. I think it's because it seems like almost all the plane crashes you hear of happened when landing or preparing to land. So i decided that if i started jumping i would,nt have to worry about landing in the plane, but would still get to fly in them. That was back in 92 and now the only thing i care about flying planes is how long it's going to take to get to altitude. I have been on a couple of loads that had to come back down for weather reasons and i was sweating my @ss off.

[Luv2Fall 0]

I often wondered what it would be like for quite a while, but never had a "burning intrest". This past November while driving home from being out of town, I passed Skydive Suffolk and saw their sign from the highway. At that moment I told myself that's what I want to do. Either that evening or early the next day, I got on the internet and found a DZ a bit closer to home and gave them a call. Two days later, I made my first tandem......was hooked and enrolled in the AFF Program. Although I only have 10 jumps (bad winter), I can say the only regret I have is that I didn't start earlier.

[kansasskydiver 0]

it was my 19th b day and a friend of mine was ging to do it already. so i decided, ehh why not. well on the way out my friend got arrested and thrown in jail, called the dz and asked for his money back for bail. i jumped, he never did. 2 years later 325 jumps, coach, sl instructor and presdient of the club. for my 20th i forget what i did and my 21st, well i can't even remember

[Gawain 0]

I had always wanted to jump...at least once. At some point though, it lost its priority.

When living in the PacNW US. I was itching for something fun to do. I wasn't interested in Fencing anymore and I was torn about buying another motorcycle because the roads in Oregon aren't in great shape and the drivers of cars concerned me too.

When I drove out to the boon-docks to buy a computer from a fella that builds them as a hobby, he also mentioned that he skydives and that was when the light flicked on again, "That's what I want to do!"

I called up the DZ, asked them what to suggest since I was certain it was going to be a long term commitment for me. She suggested AFF et voila! That was June 9, 2001.

So I try and I scream and I beg and I sigh
Just to prove I'm alive, and it's alright
'Cause tonight there's a way I'll make light of my treacherous life
Make light!

[riddler 0]

Wanted to since I can remember. Right down to jumping off my roof hanging onto a plastic yardbag (thank god the bushes under the window weren't rose bushes). I have always had dreams about freefall - my earliest dreams.

I knew it would take time and money, neither of which I had, so I finally got financially stable at 30, and made it a goal for the year. For the first year ALL of my dreams were about skydiving. Now, almost none, but have plenty of dreams about the dropzone and my skydiving friends (which are about the only friends I have left).

What does Walt Disney say - "chase your dreams" or "follow your heart" or something like that? Worked for me

Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

[Jib 0]

Last spring, I really needed a vacation but didn't have any time. I was talking to a friend and tongue in cheek said "I should just go jump out of an airplane." To which she replied, "call Mickey, he's been jumping for like 10 years." So, I did and flew out the next day (thinking it would be quicker than driving 80 miles). After the tandem, I told the videographer that I might jump again sometime... I went straight back into manifest, started AFF, got grounded because of weather, went to the local skydiver watering hole and spent the night on a couch in the hangar because of wicked thunderstorms.

--------------------------------------------------
the depth of his depravity sickens me.
-- Jerry Falwell, People v. Larry Flynt