Geronimo Part 1

 This is the story about the time I jumped out of a plane.  It was 1980, I was a junior at UM and I was 20.

        The ad in “The Weekly News” said, “Skydive Miami.  $79,” so I called and talked to James.  He gave me directions to a dusty private air field in the middle of deep South Dade.  Cash only, please, and be ready to sign a fat waiver letting us make a fuck-up or two, but probably not on your jump. 

 

         I drove down with my best friend from high school, Jill.  She wanted to try out the new camera she got for her birthday and it turned out to be a boon for her, too, because she got to ride around for  half an hour in a panel truck full of the Nude Skydiving Club.  She and the driver were the only two under forty and not naked, so it was wall to wall baggy balls, she told me, but even so, the snapshots turned out to be very tasteful.  They put their chutes in their laps.

          I’ve always been fascinated by high places, and if I hadn’t done college and grad school I might’ve been a tower crane operator or a high rise window washer. And flight is in my blood, being the daughter of a helicopter pilot, so parachuting sounded like fun. 

        When I told Dad, he regaled me with stories about his Airborne days and reminded me to tuck and roll.  He said, "Your momma never understood why someone would want to jump out of a perfectly good plane."  But I did, so off we went.

         The airfield was way out in the middle of nowhere, even past the place with the great strawberry milkshakes, Burr's Berry Farm, and I learned a lot on the drive. 

              

        On the way down, Jill told me about the concept of “tailgating” which I’d never heard before, ever.   
         She said, “For example, if you smash this Gremlin into the back of that tractor in front of us?That’s called tailgating and you get the ticket, not him.”
         I said, "How is that fair?  He's only going 12 miles an hour!  On a tractor!"
         Jill said, "You're just gonna have to trust me on this one."  So I did.

         Then the song "Turning Japanese" came on the radio.  She turned it up loud and said, "I heard this song is about jacking off."
       
        I said, "I don't get it."
         
        She squinted her eyes, stuck out her front teeth and made the universal sign for male masturbation.

         "Now I get it," I said.  Jill was only a year older than me, but she was a regular pinata of interesting information.
       

      

        

          

      .