OyChicago blog

For the woman I love, I jumped out of a plane at 14,000 feet.  

It's the biggest leap of faith I've ever made. Now I've done some pretty crazy things for love. I've gone camping (on purpose!), I've woken up before 7 a.m. (also on purpose!), and I even once wore a pair of brown loafers (not on purpose!).

But when my girlfriend asked me to take her skydiving for her 30th birthday, I pointed behind her and said, "What in the world can that be!?" and ran away.

While running, I thought to myself that I would do anything for love, but I won't do that. And then I did. Because I ran out of breath and she caught up to me. I told my girlfriend, let's call her Winter, because that's her name (I'll give you a moment to get all your obvious comments out of the way. You done? Great. Good. On we go!) that I would of course jump out of a plane with her and drop at terminal velocity for what will easily be the longest 60 seconds of my life and hopefully not be the last 60 seconds of my life.

Truth be told, it really wasn't that difficult of a decision. Remember, I had already gone camping with her and that was in tents. Good night everybody! Heh heh. See skydiving had always intrigued me but I never had anyone to do it with nor did I care enough to find someone. Well that someone had already found me and it turns out I had been dating her for over a year and had loved her for even longer.

I decided to do copious amounts of research prior to the jump (copious is a word which here means: read one article) and learned that when you jump, you really don't get that stomach drop feeling that you get while riding a roller coaster. So when the time came to actually go skydiving, I was actually looking very forward to it.

Winter was actually more nervous than me. Although my body didn't get the memo and wouldn't stop sweating. I learned this when my instructor who was tied to me told me I needed to stop sweating. Once we were at the jumping point, Winter went first and let me tell you, there is nothing quite like the experience of watching someone you love plummet out of a plane at 14,000 feet. That's one time you really see gravity in action which is a heavy situation that weighs down on me whenever I think about it. As far as my jump goes, there are few words to describe the exhilarating feeling of freefalling at 120mph, all the while screaming, "I regret nothing!!!"

Warning: this is about to get very sappy. I didn't even spill molasses so that's saying something. You have been warned.

Without Winter, I would have never gone skydiving and shared that wholly unique and incredible experience with her. It's absolutely wonderful that I can do such amazing, exciting activities with my best friend who just so happens to also be my girlfriend. Pretty sweet deal. She is an adventurer, a thrill seeker and an all-around amazing person. Why she is dating me, I have no idea.

The phrase 'opposites attract' is especially true for us because she is an extrovert and I don't want to talk about what I am. But because of this, I feel like I can do literally anything with her by my side. Like jump out of a plane for example.

What I wish everyone could experience is having the special someone that makes you an even better you. (You're already amazing because you're reading this). It doesn't even have to be a significant other. It can be a friend, a sibling, heck, it could even be you talking to yourself! For me, having an accountabili-buddy, as I like to call Winter, makes me able to do all the things I could never do by myself. She causes no stress to the point I forget the stress that should be accompanied activities like jumping out of a plane. It why when we did go skydiving, I wasn't scared. I wasn't nervous. I was happy. I was confident.

When I jumped, I was literally falling in love.