I spoke to a man who is planning to fall from the sky. He’s taking his daughter with him. Her 18th birthday is coming up and she asked to go sky diving so, being the cool/insane dad this man appears to be, he’s jumping, too. When I turned 18, I asked my parents for a fake opal ring from Service Merchandise and permission to go to a midnight movie. Yeah, I’m an adrenaline junkie from way back.
Thrill seeking is not in my DNA. I have no desire to dive from the clouds or climb a mountain that’s too tall and dangerous for its own good. As a toddler, I remember taking swimming lessons with a visibly frustrated swim teacher trying to pry my chubby fingers away from the Styrofoam floating board. I wasn’t letting go. I saw what happened to poor little Janice in the shallow end next to me. She let go of the board and sunk like a concrete block until her mom — fully clothed — jumped in as the teacher rolled her eyes.
Yet I admire those who take big chances in the air or on the ground. Such gumption! They move across the country or world for a new opportunity, redefine their identity, explore a new passion or try something new just because.
I have not strayed too far, still living in my hometown. I once rode a helicopter over the jagged cliffs of the Na Pali coast and promptly kissed the Hawaiian terra firma when we landed.
A few years ago, I watched the chilling “Man on Wire” documentary about tightrope walker Philippe Petit’s 1974 high wire routine performed between the World Trade Center’s twin towers. Watching Petit’s first tentative step on the wire was as gut-wrenching as it was exhilarating. He did this illegally while NYPD hesitantly closed in on him since the police force was short on tightrope cops.
Everyone kept asking Petit why he did this daring act in New York City.
“There is no why,” he replied.
Now that I’m older, I realize I may have missed a few invitations to push myself, though I’ve been nudged and pushed in ways I never imagined. There have been days when it felt like I was falling from the sky without a parachute. I’ve experienced adventures not of my asking, a common denominator for us all, really. Health scares, broken relationships, financial uncertainty, losing someone we love – it can be a scary freefall. This is when we have to let go of what we know and jump into what we must do. We find ourselves on the rope, gingerly assessing the next step while grasping for anything to hold onto for balance. I guess this requires a steely kind of gumption, too.
Sometimes we fly because we have to. Sometimes there is no “why.”
I can beat myself up all day on adventures I did not take. But I try to look at the chances I took and the ones I had to take to survive or help someone I love make it through a frightening time in the inky dark clouds of the unknown. It’s an emotional kind of sky diving.
For nearly an hour, Petit bounced and pivoted 110 stories above New York City. At one point, he leaned down and sat on the wire, saluting a stunned crowd below. He had this child-like grin, like “I did it!”

Adventures come in many forms, some of our choosing, some not. It’s good to stop and salute the fact we’re still standing and willing and, maybe, jumping.