I was in Las Vegas a few years ago for Spring Break. While I was there, my roommate decided that he wanted to bungee jump. Vegas has the tallest bungee tower in the United States–seventeen stories. Being a bit of an adrenalin junkie myself, I decided to join him.
We tried to go on several different days, but the wind was too strong. For obvious reasons, the company discourages jumping when there’s a possibility of customers being blown into the tower. Finally, the last day that we were there, we decided to go anyway. Because of the wind, we weren’t allowed to dive the full seventeen stories, and we needed to be harnessed around the chest. Usually, bungee jumpers harness their feet and dive head-first. Our chest harnesses let us bounce around with our heads still upright. According to the wild-eyed Australian running the show, this results in a ride that is nowhere near as good. To compensate, they offered us a free video of the event and a T-shirt at half price.
The crew weighed us, fitted us into to our gear, and soon we were riding a rocket themed elevator to the top of the tower. The rocket theme bothered me for some reason, but I couldn’t quite place my finger on the reason. It wasn’t until later, when I watched the video, that I found out that the tower hadn’t been built with bungee jumping in mind. It had been built in the 70s as some kind of observation tower. The cheap, faded plastic bolted onto the elevator car had only seemed cheesy and completely unrelated to bungee jumping: now it seemed almost malevolent. Wait, I thought to myself, You mean that in the fifteen or twenty years since this place changed hands, no one bothered to remove the silly crap that the previous owners had slapped on the elevator? Am I lucky to be alive? What the hell kind of place was this?
I was nervous. I’ve always had a bit of a fear of heights. As I a kid, I’d sometimes freeze on the monkey bars during recess. I’d stare at the ground, unable to shake the fear-induced paralysis until someone shoved me out of the way. Bungee jumping was part facing my fears, part proving to myself that they were groundless, part feeding my desire for idiotic behavior.
After about three or four jumpers, my turn cane up. The crew guys securely hooked up all my lines safely away from the open edge of the platform, and herded me to the drop-off.
“Hands up!” The Aussie ordered cheerfully. Dutifully, I raised my arms out in front of me as the elevator-ride video had instructed me. I carefully matched up my heels over the chipped and worn painted half-footprints at the edge, looked down….
I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase, “the mind reels.” It’s an explanation for an actual physical sensation that can’t really be described, only experienced. It’s similar to “having your blood run cold” in that respect. Until you’ve actually felt it, they’re only words. You may say them, but you have no full understanding of what it is that is being conveyed to you.
…and my mind reeled. I stared down, struck dumb by the one hundred and seventy-one feet between me and the ground. My lizard brain informed me in no uncertain terms that what I was about to attempt was suicide. There was no possible way that what I was about to do was a good idea, and that I needed to turn around and run right now.
But, wait… I thought, How long have I been standing here? I searched my mind frantically. I had no clue. It seemed as though I hadn’t heard anyone speak for days. But surely, in all that time, someone must have said something. There must have been some sound. For all I knew, I might have been standing there for five minutes, lost in the terror of the drop, oblivious to everything around me.
Well, one way out of this, I suppose. I knew what I had to do. I didn’t really want to do it, but I had no choice at this point. Turning back now would make me a coward and an idiot who had just wasted a good chunk of cash. I tried to leap off the edge of the platform with gusto, a wild man, the raving nutcase that my friends believed I was… but my body wouldn’t obey me. My knees held fast in their position, unwilling to give even the slight bounce that would send me off.
With my knees gone AWOL, I did the only thing I was still capable of doing: I collapsed. My knees buckled underneath me, and my outstretched arms pulled me forward instead of straight down. I fell screaming into space.
I only vaguely remember the jump itself. It was terrifying, and I spent most of the jump desperately clinging to the cord with both hands, wanting nothing more than for it to be over with.
The thing that I remember most, and will always remember, is the sheer instinctual behavior that the jump brought out in me. As a member of a more or less civilized society, I’ve learned to ignore my instincts in favor of more socially acceptable behaviors. Sniffing at crotches and peeing on rocks to mark territory may be fun, but they will also get me arrested. For most people today, it takes something like a seventeen story fall for your instincts to pick you up and shake you by the shoulders.
Two days later, when I got around to watching the video of my jump, I got a fairly amazing surprise. In the video, I walk to the edge of the platform, extend my arms, and jump off the edge without hesitation… and screaming in what is quite obviously real terror.
So would I do it again? I’m not sure. I really didn’t enjoy it, and it scared the living hell out of me. Which are probably very good reasons not to repeat the experience. But it really bothers some part of me that I couldn’t just ignore my fears and enjoy it anyway. I think the only way to really get rid of your fears is to confront them.
Maybe I’ll take up skydiving.