Free Falling

Skydiving in Panama,

When I grow up my hobby is to go around the world, especially Panama and jump out of airplanes. Why do I want to pick this as my hobby? Because I like the acrobatics that the skydivers do during the overwhelming sensation of free fall and because of the adrenaline rush they feel when they are about to exit the aircraft.

As a small child my father would come home and start packing his parachute for his daily jumps for the U.S Army; he would always put some skydiving videos so I could watch them with him. When I started crawling as a young baby I would copy the same moves that the skydivers did on the videos. The main move I practiced was the “arch” and I would never stop doing it. The “arch” is the most important position for a safe and stable free fall flight of our bodies.

The closest I have ever been to skydiving is flying in the wind tunnel in North Carolina when I was 12 years old. My father took me with my cousins, we had to take a safety test and learn the cool moves skydivers did. When it was my turn up in the wind tunnel I threw my body in how the instructor told me to and meanwhile he held on me. I would float up inside the tunnel with him, I was in the tunnel for at least 15 min. When I got out I felt like a bird. The wind tunnel has been one of the best experiences of my life.

Like I said before, I want to become a skydiver and have at least 1,000 jumps and after that I want to become an instructor and teach young teenagers how to jump safely. As I grow older I know I’ll get much more anxious to skydive, but before I die I want to skydive with my tutor and friend Alex Hamilton who is a skydiver himself. Blue skies!

(Mathew Jenkins)