I jumped out of a plane once, 3 miles in the sky. Just jumped out of a perfectly good aircraft. 3 years ago that would have seemed like the stupidest idea on the planet. Why would I want to step out of a perfectly good airplane to fall 15,000 ft through space with the possibility (seemed like a certainty at the time!) of a big fat SPLAT as the end result? As I was teetering at the doorway of the plane, 1/2 in / 1/2 out, I KNEW this was the stupidest idea EVER! I had the biggest “WTF” moment of my life. But by then it was too late. I was tumbling head over heels for 5000 ft. The world was rushing by in a blur, and all I could think of was “I can’t breathe!!!!”. It seemed to take forever.
After eternity had passed I felt this enormous jerk, my chute opened and I just stopped in mid air. I was suspended a couple of miles above earth and everything was crystal clear. The view was breathtaking and I culd see everything for miles. It was like looking at a perfect little diorama. I just wanted to stay there, suspended, until my brain had time to process everything my senses were taking in. I drifted through a cloud and tasted it. I know, wierd, but what would you do??? I looked down at the tidy little farms, each like different squares in a patchwork quilt with thier toy tractors happily chugging along. The Matchbox cars on the roads that looked like ribbons gracefully curving around the squares of the landscape quilt. I could see a minature city (Atlanta, GA) off in the distance, the windows on the highrise buildings twinkling at me like clusters of minature diamonds. There was just SO MUCH to process. I couldn’t take it all in fast enough to process it.
Then too soon it was tiMe to take control of the chute and start navigating my way slowely to the ground. I remember thinking “this is what a bird feels like”. I know, random thought, but what can I say, I had jJUST JUMPED OUT OF A PLANE!
You are probably wondering what all this has to do with the title of this post. The simple answer is: That is what the first year of my divorce felt like. There are of course differences. I willingly jumped out of that plane, well, sort of. I made the decision to do it, made the appointment, strapped on the parachute and climbed on the plane. That was the willing part. I am a little ambivalent about the actual “jumping out” part. The beginning of the end, (which I now know was in fact the beginning of my new beginning) progressed a little differently. I was obviously a participant, though the time, place and manner in which it started were not my choice. I hate that I had to react to circumstances so far out of my control on a matter so life shattering. In the course of one week my whole life shattered. Seven days to destroy what had taken twenty years to build. It still boggles my mind, and it is almost two years later from the day thAT Hurricane Divorce landed on the shores of my life. I can only describe it as total destruction. And in the aftermath you have no idea how far reaching the effects of that storm will be.
Tags: depression, divorce, honest, new beginning, new life
