[Leica] IMG: Another Smiling Jumper

[Ted Grant]

Hi Jim,
On my first Jump it was, "solo!" Oh I had some brief explanations of what to
expect and do. 
I know I was smiling and partly laughing as I was so happy to have made it
to earth without crash diving 6' under! :-)
One moment you are safely in the plane the "Jump-Master" facing you and all
of a sudden he yells... "GO!" And without thought..... out you go into the
wild blue quickly falling toward Planet Earth.
You look up to see if the chute opened? What you see is the tiny "looking"
plane you just left a few moments ago. And there is the chute canopy in full
bloom in it's beautiful colour gently lowering you downward. 
"THEN YOU LOOK DOWN AND THE WORLD?" appears like it's sort of coming at you
very quickly! :-) It isn't, unless your chute didn't open??? We wont talk
about that? 
Unfortunately for me I did come into the landing a tad fast, hit the ground
rather hard right shoulder down. (Notice not feet.) Well they did, but I
lost my balance as I was coming in a tad fast! OOPS!  A year later
re-wrecked right shoulder when falling in a graveyard while on assignment in
Russia on the Chernobyl children. Oh it hurt, not too bad! But then if
you've never been in a Russian hospital? Jeeesh "DON'T GO THERE UNLESS
YOU'RE DEAD!"
Just  grin and bear it until back home. 
Eventually a few years later had my right shoulder re-placed.  Oh well what
the heck that's part of being a world travelling photojournalist. Things
happen.  :-) :-)
Would I jump again? No because I promised my dear wife Irene I wouldn't. But
that was because she quietly offered after the first jump! 
Actually she didn't know I was going to jump until our son drove her to the
airfield. "if I ever did it again and even though I landed OK?" She would
kill me! Smiled eyeball to eyeball then quietly walked away. There you are
good Sir. And no I have never jumped again!  :-)
cheers,
Dr. ted


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