Childhood Obsession With Parachutes and Skydiving...

[sdgregory 0]

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I
Plastic football helmet, and safety goggles were
my 'gear'.

You jumped with safety gear?!?!?!

WUSSY.

Bwahahahahahahahaaaa, that was funny!

[canopycandy 0]

I only attempted to jump once as a child -- off the deck in the backyard with an umbrella, a la Mary Poppins.

But I did always like the little army guys with parachutes, even though they always got caught on the roof of the shed.

I was more the child who was obsessed with clouds. On every family vacation where we flew somewhere, my film was full of photos taken through the airplane window. I always wanted to jump out and play.

I loved clouds so much. In fact, I'm a little pissed that they're not the fluffy, magical wonderlands I imagined as a child. They're simply soggy.

[Lee03 0]

I would have to say that mine started at a very young age. I grew up watching Television programs like "Twelve O'Clock High", "Sky King", "The Whirlybirds", "Combat" and a program called "Ripcord". These shows instilled three things into me that molded much of my life. One, that I wanted to serve in the military, two, that I wanted to fly airplanes, and three that I wanted to skydive! My childhood days were filed wioth imaginary ground battles, flying imaginary fighter planes and bombers and imaginary parachute jumping. "Ripcord" was a show about skydiving, they put out a six inch tall, plastic figure molded into the shape of a skydiver. It had a plastic parachute and you folded it up, threw it up into the air, and the jumper would come down "under canopy". I had dozens of them! Then onc day when I was probably around 7 years old, I got my hands on a beach umbrella and reasoned that i could jump off the house. Needless to say, it didn't work very well, but the thought was planted in my mind. Now, I look back on my life, to this point and find. I've one, served a career in the military, two, I am a pilot, and three I am a skydiver. So I guess the seeds that were planted by the shows that I watched as a child, took root, grew and brought forth fruit. Guess I accomplished all my goals. Now I have to wonder, is there anything left to do?

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To put your life in danger from time to time ... breeds a saneness in dealing with day-to-day trivialities.

--Nevil Shute, Slide Rule

[canopycandy 0]

Think of what would have happened had you watched "Gilligan's Island" or something.

You could be marooned on an island instead of skydiving!

[tilly 0]

My Teddy bear - by the time he was 5 - now 23 had done more base jumps from our landing than most. He'd also gone in on most of those, thats probably why i decided he was male. My kittens when, they weren't being made to jump hurdles were also seasoned parachutists! I had several action men parachutists that I always thought kicked the arse out of my mates barbies and care-bears, But my fondest memory is of staying up half the night rigging together bits of string and my bedsheet, to wake up early in the morning, dry-mouthed and racing heart ready to test it, unawares that my mother was all seeing before she burst into my room screaming at me. This was the night after I'd seen some sort of skydiving on tv with my brother and he announced that girls could not do it and it was in fact probably 'against the lord' to do so. How many jumps has he done to date. Big fat scared shitless zero!!!!

[Yoshi 0]

between my brother and I we made all kinds of things to use while descending from various items. we made a repeling harnes out of a bike tire and the "rope" was an old garden hose what we used to repell out of trees with. we also used to jump out of trees (doing our own kind of plf) without anything.. (30-40 foot pine trees) get to the top...jump jsut slightly out..and slide all the way down the outside of the pine tree only to smack the ground and get back up to do it again (and the only bone I have ever broken is my nose...and until 2 years ago the only bone my brother has ever broken was MY nose)

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this space for rent.

[WrongWay 0]

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I'm a little pissed that they're not the fluffy, magical wonderlands I imagined as a child. They're simply soggy.

Sounds like somebody had a traumatic Cap N' Crunch incident as a child. It's okay to share with the group....

Wrong Way
D #27371 Mal Manera Rodriguez Cajun Chicken Ø Hellfish #451
The wiser wolf prevails.

[airtwardo 7]

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Think of what would have happened had you watched "Gilligan's Island" or something.

You could be marooned on an island instead of skydiving!
***
Oh No!
Not the Ginger vs. Maryanne
thread again!!

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

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[Lee03 0]

Oh No!
Not the Ginger vs. Maryanne
thread again!!
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Ah yes, Ginger AND MaryAnn!

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To put your life in danger from time to time ... breeds a saneness in dealing with day-to-day trivialities.

--Nevil Shute, Slide Rule

[airtwardo 7]

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Ah yes, Ginger AND MaryAnn!

To put your life in danger from time to time...

***
Those two lines together
pretty much sum it up!

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

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[SkydiverRick 0]

Then onc day when I was probably around 7 years old, I got my hands on a beach umbrella and reasoned that i could jump off the house.

[JUDYJ 0]

As a child I dreamed of flying. Not with parachutes or any gear...just flying above our house or above the playground at school. Turning and going up and down was as easy as a bird. My 'fear' was never ever of flying. Oh no, it was that I would go too high and never come down. I would be very careful in my dreams to stay at a certain level (altitude) so that I couldn't go to high. I am sure there are other analysis to these dreams but that can wait!

Well, being new to skydiving and living in OK where gusts of winds were topping around 50mph Sunday, I made my first off landing on AFF3. Let's see it wasn't far from the dz and my J/M stayed on the radio and warned me about objects below. I avoided all the hay bales and one tree and the barb wire fence. I flared a bit too soon and "thud" I landed in the moist pasture.

I no longer have a fear of going to high and not being able to come down....

IF you are going to be Stupid - you better be tough!

[Lee03 0]

Those two lines together
pretty much sum it up!
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Yeah, but that's the kind of danger that I wouldn't mind facing!

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To put your life in danger from time to time ... breeds a saneness in dealing with day-to-day trivialities.

--Nevil Shute, Slide Rule

[dterrick 0]

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Then onc day when I was probably around 7 years old, I got my hands on a beach umbrella and reasoned that i could jump off the house.

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Not much worse than landing a round reserve.

I've done both. The house thing was only a 9 foot drop (summer) off the porch roof but in the winter I was able to pile about 4-5 feet of snow up as a cushion. For some strange reason the snow got harder and harder....

Ski jumping was something else I enjoyed in my high school days - that was WORSE than a PLF because, on the prairies, the hills were roughly like NHL ice on a slope and if you wiped out you wiped out at swoop speeds and had gear entanglements with no helmet. In my earliest ski seasons the bindings still had "safety straps" and that invariably meant a ski up the wazoo . In fact, our Junior Jazz band nearly didn't make the Optimist Festival that year because we had an alto sax player in a leg cast, a trumpet player with a broken wrist, and me with a sprained thumb. We didn't play our best ...


-Dave

Life is very short and there's no time for fussing and fighting my friend (Lennon/McCartney)