A Bit About Skydiving

Trust me when I tell you that skydiving is not for everyone. Especially for me, I was bad at it. But I loved it for the ridiculous smile it gave me and the sense of raw fun. Nothing like the smell of jet fuel and hurtling to the earth (unmotorized) at 187 mph to start one's day.
Personally I was going through a very tough time and knew I had to do something that would wake up my sense of fun and wonder; something totally outrageous. So, I learned how to skydive.
Since a bad skydiver equals a dead skydiver, I had to quit jumping. I really miss it though; I look at planes flying overhead and wonder where the exit door is and whether or not I've ever jumped from one.
I have lots of precious memories of my friends, of the fun we'd have in freefall as well as on the ground. Skydiving is a whole lifestyle, not just a sport.
One particularly sweet memory comes to mind today:
I was in freefall and noticed I was several hundred feet above a hawk circling her pastures. As I came toward her, I dipped my shoulder to follow her spirals. For a moment there was just the two of us in the whole world, me and a hawk.
She flew off to continue hunting and I opened canopy to float home.