{Saturday, May 1, 2:56 p.m.}

.:: glee-falling ::.

my flimsy black shoes stare up at me, afraid. yet obediently they creep forward. left, then right, then left again, a centimeter at a time. my ankles stiffen inside the towel strapped around them as they sense the increasing weight of the attached elastic cord that slinks off the platform and loosely coils itself around another rope like a sixty-pound snake. then, the edge. my toes hang over. my fingers grip the side railing. there is nothing in front of me. nothing below me. i am standing on a tiny platform protruding from an old bridge that sits one hundred and forty feet above a green river lined with shale and salmonberry bushes. the world is beautiful. i am insane.

–are you ready? yes. i suppose i could have said no. it’s too late now. he is going to say 3-2-1-Bungee and then it will be over. –wave at the camera down there. done. already i can’t remember if i smiled or not. my stomach twists itself inside me like a wrung-out washcloth. my pulse pounds just above my left ear. –3. here it comes. –2. i’m not going to jump. i can’t do this. –1. i do not have to do this. –Bu …

i am going to die. oh, sweet Jesus, make it stop, make it stop, i actually jumped and there is nothing to grab on to and i can’t even close my eyes or make a sound. hallelujah, that’s the cord!!! tuck, katie, tuck, you are going up now. you’re flying! {i yell: this rocks! and make the corresponding hand gestures. then suddenly i am flipping down.} arch back, arms out, where am i, have i come back up again yet? oh shoot, here i am and i forgot to tuck, back down now. alright, i actually am spinning now, i don’t know what the heck happened in the last five seconds but now i am hanging by my ankles with my arms oustretched pirouetting above the water. ten feet above the water. how am i supposed to get into the rubber raft? and … it’s over. it went by so fast …

–grab hold of the pole. my arm stretches out towards it and misses. they must have let out more rope because now i am only three feet above the water. i swing back and catch the pole this time. –give me your hand. now your other hand. like that? –perfect.

i am suspended by my feet (which are tied together i might add), holding hands with a guy in a rubber raft who has braced himself frog-legged against the side in preparation for the next maneuver. this is not exactly awkward because it is the standard procedure at the end of a jump. it is just a little … different.

–now do a situp and reach up toward your toes. by some magical coordination of body and rope movement, i am suddenly lying on my back in the raft with my feet being slowly lowered from the perpendicular to the parallel. i am lying down in a soft inflatable boat and i am still alive and i just had the most exhilarating experience of my life.

what’s more, i have just accomplished Life Goal #72. at this precise moment, i do believe that i, katie geiger, am the express personification of unbounded glee.