Ever since I was little, I’ve always found myself participating in activities that most people would call stupid.
On my 5th birthday while everyone was outside the house waiting for me, I colored myself blue with the food coloring that my mom was using to make my cake… Then to my astonishment, when I went to show my mom, she got mad at me… At me!!! On my birthday!!!! Ok, given I was blue and everyone was waiting outside… But I looked so cool! I was a real life smurf =)
Fast forward about 10-11 years, before the movie Jackass came out, I found myself in the street at 3 am with a couple of friends pushing a buddy down a hill in a shopping card with a broken wheel. Sparks were flying, the cart sped up and went out of control, and I lost grasp of the handle as he sped towards a speed bump. Oh how funny it was! Until he went flying out of the cart into the street… I was still laughing as he rolled around in agony.
This winter, I decided to learn to snowboard. Armed with about 1500$ in new gear and Mike as my instructor, I took to the hills and within 2 months, I was on the double diamonds… Not to let anyone down, I decided it was time to attempt a jump… Without scouting it… I went for it, started flying in the air, then lost balance, hit some ice, sprained both of my wrists and hurt my knee… Aren’t I smart? (Side note: I’m DYING FOR THE SEASON TO START UP AGAIN!!!!)
On to the topic at hand… From what you probably realized by now, I’m a yes man… This doesn’t mean that I give people all my money, or jump off cliffs… Ok scratch the second part, I have that planned for the week of May 9th…
The “Yes man” thing lead me to try bungee jumping last August (See below)
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Once I tried bungee jumping, I realized how much of an addiction to adrenaline I really have… It’s not the fact that I like doing stupid things, it’s the fact that I’m addicted to the rush of adrenaline that usually comes with the accomplishment of these stupid things.
So I decided it was time to step up to the plate and try the ultimate rush… Or so I thought…
I had spent the next 2 months organizing a group of 30 people to jump with me. On the day of the jumps, the weather was too cloudy for us to be allowed into the sky. The owner of the drop zone called me at 6 am to tell me that we’d have to wait till later in the day and we weren’t sure if we’d even get off the ground… So we went go karting instead… And after 30 minutes of go karting, out driving everyone who had came with me, I got bored and annoyed and decided to take the risk and drive an hour away to the drop zone.
Octobe 4th 2009, the day I did my 1st tandem jump. My instructor, who’s name I forgot at the time in all the excitement was a 6 foot tall guy who didn’t say a word and had black gloves with green skeleton hands printed on the back. He wore an orange and white jump suit, and towered over me like a hungry gorilla…
I asked him what brought him into the sport to teach and his response: “I don’t like to work.”
I turn to my friend Louis who was on the same plane load as I, and he says “This is the first time I get on a plan in which I will not be landing”… What great statements to attribute to my future addiction for which I was so excited to finally be part of.
It was the shortest minute of my life.
As soon as I walked back into the Manifest (For those of you who don’t know what it is or don’t sky dive, basically it’s like the administrative office for the drop zone) I went straight into the owner’s office and spoke to him about taking lessons. He was fairly quick to offer me to come with his school to Zephyrhills Florida (Skydive city) and take my PFF there in March. (The weather in Montreal isn’t exactly sky dive friendly between November and April)
So I started putting money aside and come March, I was on a flight to Zhills…
I am now CSPA Solo certified with 12 jumps in my logbook, I’m planning on completing my A license in May.
– Adam AKA Double A