Monday 27 April 2009

Parachutes. Not Just a Coldplay Album.



No matter what you do in life, there's always someone there to point how things can really, tragically go wrong. Whether it be learning to drive, swimming lessons in a pool or simply sharpening your pencil. I vaguely remember back to Primary School, of our teacher warning about us running on the paths. From what I recall we got told about a  boy only a few years older than ourselves who was running, tripped and his legs fell off or something. Actually, I don't think it was quite that drastic but the teacher made it seem that  way. Even holding the pen wrong seemed very, very dangerous. 

Funny thing is, there's always that kid in your group of friends, mine was called Harrison, who takes it the extra mile and says the kid died. Or that his nose got knocked into his face. And then when you ask how he knows this, he says he knows the kid and he lives on his street. In comparison, my street always seemed very boring.

Then, one day we were talking about people who's parachutes don't open. All sorts of fantastic stories started popping up. According to Harrison someone once landed on our own school oval and died and that his friend knew him. No one could really top that. That is until I remembered a family friend of ours had skydived and the parachute didn't  open properly. According to my Mum he started spiraling and hit trees then the ground. He broke both his legs and but survived an improperly opened parachute jump. Later we went and saw him in his wheelchair once he was back from hospital. But more importantly than that, Harrison said nothing and I held everyone's deep respect for the entire of that lunchtime. I think it would have continued too, but apparently Harrison saw a Alien spaceship from his bedroom that night.  

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