It is for those who want to feel ‘the thing’, those who strive for that extra ounce of adrenalin and more important for those who have dried their God’s gift of grey cells. What I am going to tell you all now is the truthful confessions of a paratrooper and god bless those who deny the feeling is true.
Well I always had that inkling in me to do the Para Jumps and see what it feels to fall from the skies. All was going well and the motivation was at the brim till I happened to witness a story of a free fall from a mere 2000 ft. And the story goes like this- the parachute and the paratrooper diverged from their parabolic trajectory and landed in different directions. Unfortunately the 1.5 lacs worth of parachute did not survive the fall as it landed in the nearby river and was lost beyond recovery. The packer was fired for being unable to explain the loss of the chute.
With this story at the back of my mind, I was compelled to be a reluctant participant for jumps. With a clear head and a statistical probability of surviving heavily loaded in my favour I did acquiescence. All ground training goes well with minor bruises, muscular cramps, shin pains and compulsory doses of boosters by the seniors and you are ready for the D Day. Those who say they have never felt butterflies in their stomach are big liars, bloody big liars. Now adding a huge weight of the chute to the butterflies your mind goes into the rewind mode and portraits of all the good times, your loved ones , your sad times blur through the hazy memory and amidst this matrix of thoughts you put up a bravado of Yes I will Jump, I better jump. The helicopter lands and you are given the invitation to be the first jumper and of course you have that nagging doubt “hope my chute hasn’t been packed by a rookie packer”
Ok you are still on terra firma till then and you imagine the helicopter taking off and the gap between the firm ground and yourself getting blurred by layers of stratosphere od ionosphere whatever your geography teacher called it back then but surely it is not lithosphere. You see the ground below the helicopter and you are not supposed to shiver, but by god whichever deity you believe in, the mind goes numb and the face is dead pan expressionless. A singular thought flashes across your mind “God save me today” . But not its too late. Lots of aviation fuel has been vaporized to prepare you for just this moment.
Everyone is told to stand up. Ooops…! It is at this precise moment, yes exactly at this moment when any SOB will part with his most prized possession, yes give it away without prejudice but unfortunately there are no takers. Now you are just above the dropping zone(DZ) the pilots announce over the intercom but where the hell is it you wonder because from the height at which you are land everywhere looks just the same, frigid, motionless, resplendent and mercilessly uninviting. The harder you try the tenser you become and the butterflies in your stomach do a full tango. Then the light turns RED meaning stand to and ready to jump. Your eyes are shut tight, memories are crystal clear and whomsoever you love or ever loved, you will remember and in an instant twenty odd years of your life will flash by you all at once. Then the moment of reckoning arrives and the light turns GREEN meaning Jump and lighten the craft of your heavy burden. You are reluctant but then there is a long sortie of similar unnerved bodies waiting behind you and you are their leader. No you want to scream but no sounds emerge from your mouth and before you even explain your point of view some SOB dispatcher pushed you out as you shout out your obscenities at the vast expanse of the atmosphere around you. You begin to count one, two ,three seconds and your chute hasn’t opened up. You wonder if this has been some grave mistake by a rookie packer and then you feel the sudden levitation in the air and the obscenities leave your cusp and you are relieved.
You are gliding down but just as the land arrives , you cannot judge your speed and you fall with a thud like a sack of potatoes. Your head strikes the surface, your back bleeds from the scratches and your knees are wobbly. You are all in tangles but you are safe on terra firma. You have landed and the next time you swear- you or any of those you love will not suffer this misadventure of a para jump but then you don’t have much choice as the pride of the unit and the carrot of the wings hang before you. So you are ready for the jump the next morning and the morning after that till your parachute fails or you break yourself or you just learn to become an intrepid MAVERICK like many others before you.
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