Man with Parachute
Last year I jumped off a mountain. Since I am afraid of heights, I had not planned such a thing, but I was on a trip and had vowed to a friend to be more to experience. Which is how the 9200 foot tandem paraglide jump in Sun Valley, Idaho happened.
I have been asked by a number of people if it changed me. The answer is a qualified yes. There was no big “aha!” moment where I suddenly realized I was free and had no fears. But there was a subtle shift from my lifelong tendency, when afraid, to say “no,” to being able to remind myself that I jumped off a mountain, which makes whatever is scaring me no longer so big.
This piece is was inspired by that jump. It is about the metaphor of taking a leap into something that we know probably will not kill us, but scares us terribly anyway. And it is about bringing something back: the courage to jump again and again.