Though I walk through the valley of indecision...I will fear no time constraints.

If I could bottle up the feeling that you get when you are free-falling from 13,000 feet in the air, I could probably sell it for a million dollars.

Ever since I went bungee jumping with Kristin in Ecuador last year (http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=2081937131825&set=vb.1346996535&type=2&theater) I have been wanting to do something crazy like that again. It's like finally reaching that point where you are the most alive you're ever going to be. This past spring, one of Jean's friends (who may or may not be in the 50's-ish range...) told me that she had gone skydiving as like a "mid-life-crisis-clearing-the-head" type deal. And she loved it. One of my pastors recently went as well, and when I heard them sharing about it, something inside me said, "Hey. I want to do that." Well, I get a little sick of things piling up on my to-do list, so I decided to go for my birthday this year. The website said that if I get a group of five people, everyone gets $5 off. YES, I LOVE discounts. I wasn't sure if I would be able to find five people...but low and behold, we ended up with six. It's good to know I've got some fearless folks by my side.

So yesterday morning I got up after a restless night of tossing and turning, bought some tickets to Mexico, and then headed out to Wisconsin. My stomach was feeling a little but like it knew something BIG was coming. I just can't outsmart my stomach. I ate an apple and then decided I shouldn't put anything else in there or it might not stay. I drove with my friend John out to Baldwin, WI where we were scheduled to jump. We found it in the middle of a cornfield. Just a barn, some campers, a big empty field, and parachutes. And a staff of crazy guys who jump out of planes for a living. Ok. Once the rest of our whole group got there (including my cousin and her boyfriend, and another friend and her dad...what a great group) we signed our lives away on a 7-page liability suicide note and watched a movie with a strange man in a long beard warning us that we might die. Then there was a quick demonstration on what would happen when we jumped out of the plane, and how to position our bodies...all of which I completely forgot the minute the door opened on the plane.

We ended up waiting for a while. Another group jumped ahead of us, so we waited for them. Then we got hooked up in these strappy, buckly, ( and, according to the men, EXTREMELY) uncomfortable harnesses. At this point I was feeling ok, a little jumpy (no pun intended) but it still felt a little surreal. We had to wait for some clouds to pass by and a little rain to stop, and apparently I was pacing a lot.

Finally, it was time to go up in the plane, and my stomach shot up to my throat. We got into the plane, single-file, and sat on long benches, facing the back of the plane. Then we went up, up, UP. The staff guys who were jumping tandem with us were joking around and keeping us calm...mostly. I kept glancing out the window of the plane...the houses became ants and the cornfields were checkerboard spaces. The next sequence of events happened really fast. The door of the plane opened and I was suddenly handed a pair of goggles as cold wind whipped around us. Ohmygosh. Harmony was the first of our group to go and I saw her disappear out of the plane, just like that. We all scooted forward. I was close enough to the door to see John being tossed out and just DROP out of sight. Then it was my turn. Every nerve in my body was screaming "NOOOOO" but I was all hooked up the guy jumping with me and I really had no choice in the matter. He stood so I stood. He crouched so I crouched. My heart was pounding in my ears. You know that feeling when you are at the top of a big roller coaster and you are about to go down a huge drop? Mulitply that by one hundred. The next thing I knew we were falling. Just falling. Nothing holding me. The earth below, the sky above and I was just free falling. We turned a little and I was facing the sky. I noticed my shoes were untied. I couldn't think about anything but falling. We turned back around and I saw the hazy earth below. The wind was screaming in my ears and I could barely take a breath. I don't know if I screamed...maybe a little. I got the tap on my should which mean I was supposed to spread my arms out, and I felt like I was pushing against a brick wall. Just falling. That was my favorite moment...that's the feeling I want to bottle up. I don't know how long we were falling like that, but I had just begun to really enjoy it when my guy opened up the parachute and I was jerked into a sitting position. Then all the ear-splitting noise was silenced and he adjusted the straps a little and we began to glide. He let me steer (aka, I held the loops and helplessly tried to pull the parachute in different directions....he may have helped a little), and we chatted and floated around in small circles as I looked beyond my dangling feet at the houses that were beginning to look more like mouse houses, then baby monkey houses, then cat houses.

"Do you believe in God?" I asked my guy. "Cuz I sure do."

When we landed (on our rear ends) it was smooth and not nearly as jolting as I was expecting it to be. I took a breath that I hadn't taken in the last 13,000 feet and jumped up as the parachute softly landed around us.

"Can we go again?" I asked. He said I could...it would only cost me another 120 bucks.

So. It was an awesome experience. A momentary distraction from the chaotic busyness that is my life. I feel like my life has been just a tornado of events, and God keeps pickup up the snow globe and shaking things up so that it all falls in different patterns every time. I just have to trust that His parachute works and that He will land us in exactly the right spot.

A few pictures: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4557292334158.2184911.1346996535&type=1&ref=notif&notif_t=like
(I didn't pay the extra 90 bucks to get the really good shots as we were falling out of the plane, so you'll just have to imagine them)