Facing My Fear
I know that the last few post have been OLD news. Me talking about my childhood. Have no fear I’m about to do it again.
The Old Fair Oaks Bridge
As a kid I was deathly afraid of heights. It made me dizzy to look out the second floor window at the ground. So I decided that in order to get over my fear I would have to face it. The picture above is a picture of the old Fair Oaks Bridge in Sacramento, California. I went out there quite often to go swimming in the American River. I would see people jumping off the bridge and it looked like they were having fun. We went out there one day when I was 10 or 11 years old and my dad and his friend were going to jump off the bridge. There is a six foot high chain link fence that runs along both sides of the bridge. I watched my dad and his friend both climb over and jump. It didn’t look so bad from the safe side of the fence. It was my turn to jump. I climbed up one side of the fence and as I was about to put my leg over to the other side I looked down and it looked like it was suddenly twice as high now that I wasn’t looking down “through” the fence but over it. I sucked it up and continued over. Then I was standing on the other side with my back to the fence looking down and holding on for dear life. I don’t know how long I stood there but it felt like it was at least 20 minutes. There were boats going by and people standing on the banks of the river, and people walking by on the bridge who stopped to watch. Everybody was saying “JUMP!” They were really loud at first, then they faded out like somebody reached out and turned the volume knob down. I was hyper focused on the three square feet of water where I figured I would land and everything else went blurry. I was worried that as soon as I jumped a boat would come under me and I would hit the deck. Then a mother duck with her ducklings started swimming right next to the spot where I would land. I thought about the look of surprise on the duck’s face and I was in the air, falling, spinning my arms trying to stay upright. then everything went black. I came to just as my head went under the water, and I was about 15 feet under the water before I started making my way back up. I broke though the surface and swam ashore. The bottoms of my feet hurt like heck where they slapped the water, but I felt great! I Did It! and I vowed never to do it again.
I can’t say that that day cured my fear of heights completely, but ever since it has been a more rational fear. Now I love to go up to high places, just as long as I’m on the safe side of the fence.