Plane Crazy

Sophie called me one evening while I was watching a movie in my small, one bedroom, San Francisco apartment on Lombard Street -- and yes, that is the curly one, but eight blocks west towards the Golden Gate Bridge.

"Scott, how would you like to go parachuting with me and Brian," she asked me sweetly in her sing-song French accent, diluted by years of residency in the states.

"I've always wanted to try it!" I exclaimed.

"I know," she replied, "now you have no choice but to go through with it."

"Ok, I'm in. I'll see if Eric wants to go to."

The four of us met at Yolo County Airport, a dusty airstrip in the middle of rural farm country, somewhere between San Francisco and Sacramento. Sophie and Eric were apparently good to go, feeling no pain and looking forward to the jump, while Sophie's husband Brian was turning pale. My anticipation was building too, so Brian and I tried to rally one another while our counterparts picked fun at us.

Our jump was to be from thirteen thousand feet, with an instructor secured to our backs with a tandem harness. We were separated into groups and told what to do, and assured that if our first chute didn't deploy, a backup would deploy automatically at 2000 feet.

We filed into the plane like army ants, and took our seats inside the cabin. I was the second to last in line, which made me the second jumper to go. Three guys sporting California tans sat by the open side door wearing nothing but shorts and chutes, and were chattering amongst themselves. They jumped out one after the other at eleven thousand feet, screaming like wild monkeys. I was reminded of Point Break and felt a surge of envy.

When we reached our elevation, the man in front of me, a mellow looking Mexican man, took his place at the edge of eternity, froze solid and refused to move. After some cajoling, he finally jumped. Then it was my turn.

After watching my predecessor's embarrassing display, I was determined to go without pause. I stepped to the edge and looked at the green and brown checkerboard below me, and nearly lost my nerve. The instructor was yelling something at me that I couldn't make out, but I bent me knees and leaned over the edge, only held up by the instructors resistance. He gave up on saying it, and grabbed my hair and yanked my head back, as I was taught to do before, and finally let us teeter overboard.

We twisted in the air to look up at the receding plane, already the size of a child's toy. We turned back towards the ground, and the rush of air was intense, like riding on a motorcycle with no helmet on a desert road at full throttle. I felt like Bruce Banner as he transforms into the Incredible Hulk; every inch of my body was electric.

The instructor grasped my wrist and pushed my arm down. We spun like a helicopter blade, and I had to close my mouth and tighten my stomach before it came out like a bad meal. It nearly did me in as I panicked to lift it back up, but he held down tight, the shock of which angered and shamed me to a degree, so I upped the ante and jerked my arm farther down, which spun us even faster. It felt like a hammer ride I once rode at a carnival, where the G forces were so intense that my face felt like it was clamped in a vise. It was his turn to panic, and he yanked furiously at my arm, but I didn't budge -- right away. I let up when my point was made.

He was none to happy with me when we hit the ground, but the adrenaline coursing through my veins dulled my ability to care. I unstrapped while I watched the three half naked guys shoving at one another.

"Don't hit me from behind like that man!" The one yelled. Apparently they had also watched Point Break and were reenacting some crazy scenes.

Brian landed next and was just as jacked as I was, and we hurriedly told each other of our experience, with the instructor still glaring at me nearby. Sophie and Eric landed soon after, and both were worse for the wear, looking like extras for The Night of the Living Dead.

"Jesus! Are you ok Sophie," I asked.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

A Load of Bull

My cousin Fess was a cowboy in every sense of the word, and even Conway Twitty -- may he rest in peace -- who lamented, "don't call him a cowboy until you've seen him ride," would have agreed. His bull riding buddies were a breed apart, sculpted from the rock of our eastern Washington canyons, living their lives from one rodeo to the next.

One of his friends, Crazy Joe, I met at an overnight campout before the Winthrop Rodeo, where, to quote David Allan Coe, "the bikers stare at cowboys, who are laughing at the hippies, who are praying they get out of here alive." The town was a juxtaposition of Harleys and pickup trucks, "Mom" tattoos and oversized belt buckles. Crazy Joe was the quintessential bull rider, full of bravado and afraid of no man. Around the camp fire, he told the story of how he managed to evade the long arm of the law.

"The cop tells me to put my hands on the hood of the car and starts pattin' me down, so I bashed my fuckin' face like three times until I'm black and blue and blood is gushing from mouth and nose."

"Holy shit," I was stunned.

"Yeah, and the cop is yellin' at me to stop, and I'm yellin' stop hurtin' me, and people was drivin' by starin' and all."

"So he let you go?"

"Had no fuckin' choice."

Fess, sitting with me, laughed, "That's why they call him Crazy Joe."

Another of his friends, John, was a short and squat bulldog of a man, whose anger spit fumes like sauna rocks. Nobody ever said an unkind word to his face and walked away with theirs as originally arranged. He was a zen buddhist of attitude adjustment, and I've seen him back off men twice his size.

I saw a drunk once in the stands of another rodeo, popping off at everyone that walked by, spoiling for a fight. After a half hour of not finding any takers, he wandered back to where the bull riders were preparing, and started his flap with John. He stumbled back out of the chutes holding onto his nose like that little boy with his thumb in the dike.

All of Fess' friends had similar stories. But for all their grit and steel, they were the best people to be around, full of fun and good times, and as welcoming and considerate as you would please.

At this particular rodeo, Fess had finally convinced me to give it a crack. He was pleased with the bull that I had drawn. When my turn came to ride, the bull was fairly sedate in the chute. Fess coached me on what to do. I put a glove on my left hand, which had some kind of resin on it for grip. The bull had a loop at the base of it's neck through which I could barely slip my hand, and I feared that it would never come back out. The bull was furious but still, it's heaving breath sounded like a steam engine. Fess raised his right arm and slugged the bull in the nose, and the bull roared and tried to crawl out of the chute and nearly smashed me flat into the ceiling.

"What the fuck are you doing Fess?!"

"Getting him angry! He's too calm, you'll never score any points if he doesn't try to throw you."

Several cowboys jumped up and ushered him back down into the chute, but I was nearly spent. What courage I had mustered was quickly failing me, but I got back on.

What happened next might as well have been a dream. I nodded my head, which was the ready signal, but from behind myself, like I was a spectator at my own execution. The bull shot out and I fell off, simple as that. Fess took a picture and my long lanky body was already half way to the ground. The bull kicked up his back legs and landed in front of my chest by a few inches, then was ran off by rodeo clowns. Aside from the dirt sandwhich, I was fine, and feeling quite satisfied that I had tried.

But in neglect of conventional wisdom, I did not try try again.