Risk and Realization

Today was the day all you parents and families have been dreading and the day the team has been waiting for with excitement and nervousness with loud shouts of woo-woot. Before I begin, let me just assure you that we are all safe and sound after that 216 meter dive off bridge at 80 mph.

After a six hour drive the group spilled out of the cars, registered, suited up, and walked under the bridge to the platform where the deep ravine was waiting, whistling with wind and cold sea air. Crossing to the platform changed people from slightly jittery to full on nervous, who knew what the plunge would be like?

Afterwards people said that it was silent, that their minds went blank and they couldn't eve scream as they began to fall. Blood rushed to their heads and the thick chord caught them, swinging them upwards again. Time was frozen, everything still and clear and alive. But then again, I wouldn't know. I didn't jump.

It has been on my mind a lot, for most of this trip actually, that most people given a chance to do the highest bungy jump in the world would gladly take it, yet I easily refused. The idea of jumping never even crossed my mind. From the moment the jump was suggested months ago, I knew I wouldn't be going. Honestly the idea of the jump does not appeal to me at all. There were shirts in the gift shop that said, "Fear is temporary. Regret is permanent!" I knew it would have been one thing if I refused to jump out of fear. But for me it was not necessarily fear, though that was some of it, but a lack of desire, a contentment with watching others jump and screaming and sharing the experience from the lookout point.

Do you want to know the only reason I would have considered jumping? It would have been to prove to others, to the group, to random people at school or church that I was daring and adventurous. People respect you if you've done something like that, they are in awe of you for you have done what they only wish to do. But if you had the chance and refused it, people look confused, or aghast and ask you, "Why?" They don't make any tee shirts for bystanders, or take any pictures of the people who watch.

But today I realized, with surprise, and contentment, that I jumped by not jumping. For me it was a risk to not go, a risk to stand up to the few and the many imagined faces who shook their heads at me and said, "coward." I respect my friends for jumping, for looking into the face of the abyss and saying "here I come." and I also respect me for being content with not going. I've Found God works in many ways, and He will love you, whether you jump off a bridge or not.

Erin Greenhalgh