Five Ways Death Will Never Conquer Me

I hesitate to be so conceivably morose, yea, perchance even a bit macabre (pronounced mack-uh-bree), but I can think of no more opportune time than the day before Halloween to present to you my list of The Top 5 Ways I Do NOT Want to Die. ‘Tis the season!

1. Shark Attack. Perhaps this is the most disconcerting to me, because I have it on pretty good authority that this is exactly how I am going to die. And by “good authority,” I am of course referring to “unfounded and irrational fear.” You can read about my feelings (i.e.: fear and loathing) regarding sharks by clicking here. And in case you are wondering whether or not I am more afraid of being ripped to shreds by a shark, or swallowed whole, it is the latter. Because in order to be swallowed whole, that mother has got to be pretty big. And it’s the size of the beast that frightens me most.

2. Being at the top of the Sears Tower (or Willis Tower), leaning up against the glass to look below, and having the glass break and falling through the glass. Truth be known, this could never actually happen to me. Because leaning against the glass alone would give me a heart attack, and thus, falling to my death would be, as Rick Springfield so eloquently put it in his hit single Jesse’s Girl, a mute point.

3. Having a magic trick go horribly wrong and being sawed in half. Couldn’t happen you say? Or could it happen SO easily that your head is spinning like a top!? Insane, am I?! Or am I SO sane that I just blew your mind?! Impossible, is it? Or is it SO possible, that your world is crashing down around you?!

4. Being outside the space ship and having the cord snap and floating silently away into outer space. For this reason, David Bowie’s Space Oddity and Peter Schilling’s Major Tom straight-up freak me right the heck out.

5. On the toilet. This is really more about location than anything. And I trace this trepidation back to the stories surrounding the death of one Mr. Elvis Aaron Presley. What a shame. How do you recover from that? Turns out you can’t, because guess what – you dead. And I suppose that’s what I don’t like about it. When you die, your mortal body is expired. But your legacy lives on. But not if you die on the toilet. You’ll have to have two funerals – one for you and one for your dignity. Doesn’t matter if you invented penicillin, birthed Oprah, or sold 18 ka-billion records. You will be remembered for one thing. Number 2.

Is there a way I would prefer to die – other than the old cliché of “in my sleep?” I suppose death by overeating of ice cream would be acceptable. “His body just couldn’t handle that much lactose. We did all we could. He felt no pain. Look at him smiling.”

Skydiving: The Only Way to Die

Having recently reminisced about the 20-year anniversary of moving to Hawaii, I have recalled yet another memory of that same era. The memory of the day my father tried to kill me.

It was on the plane ride from Los Angeles to Honolulu when Dad announced that when we landed in Hawaii, he had arranged for some of us to go skydiving.

sky·div·ing [skahy-dahy-ving] – noun – an ancient Hawaiian word, which, when properly translated, means “fine, go ahead and kill yourself.”

Dad had been trained in Vietnam to skydive, but was never given the opportunity to perform. Skydiving probably being the only joy that Vietnam offered my dad, and then having that opportunity taken from him, I think the idea had been festering in his heart and soul for far too many years, and now he had definitely gone bananas. (Or coconuts—pick your poison.) I wasn't too excited about dad killing himself, but to involve me seemed completely unnecessary.

It soon become painfully obvious, however, that this was not my decision to be made. On our third day on Oahu Dad informed me that we were heading for our death sentence. Dad felt we had no time for silly “lessons” or “instructions” or “legal steps” that are required before skydiving, so he had made a Plan B. How he researched this place is a mystery to me, but he found his Plan B.

On the north side of Oahu, in a spacious, grassy field, stands a tiny hut, where Bubba and Buddy hang out all day, drinking beer and admiring the makeshift airplane they must have stolen from some unsuspecting cropduster. And they sit there waiting with a small hope that fools like us will pull up and give them enough money for more beer.

So, we fools pull up, throw some money at them, and they take us inside their tiny hut and explain that we’ll be jumping “tandem” – meaning that one of them will be attached to me by a thin cord that is tied to our waists. Apparently this is the loophole by which they can legally send us up without any instruction. As if any of this sounds legal.

Dad went up and jumped first, while we all stayed on good ole’ terra firma and watched. As Dad floated gently to the ground, I was ecstatic that I would not be left to provide for my family at the tender age of seventeen. It was my turn to go, so I made the announcement that I was going to now board the plane, unless someone wanted to just put a bullet in my head now and save some cash. No takers. I climbed aboard the plane, looked at the man whose hands I was putting my life in, and choked back a tear. There was one seat on the plane, and thankfully, it belonged to the pilot. I took a seat on the wood floor, sat up against the side of the plane, and wondered if any of my friends in California would come all the way to Hawaii for my funeral, and what my mom would serve them. I hoped she would serve her delicious homemade bread. I should have said something before getting on the plane. But it was too late now.

The plane itself didn't seem all that sturdy, and as a paying customer, I was of the opinion that I should be the one wearing the parachute, instead of the “professional” jumping with me. I looked at the other men on the plane and noticed I was the youngest person jumping. I wondered why the rest of them had decided to do this. Surely their dads were not forcing them into it.

We reached the two-mile point, and the instructor slid open the door to reveal nothing but blue. I couldn't see the ground, the ocean – nothing. And I was seated, most unfortunately, right by the door. The two other individuals on the plane decided not to jump. I now had the power of the crowd on my side. I could have easily been turned, were it not for the words of the instructor “Whether you jump or not, you still pay.” The fear of confronting my father and telling him, “Hey, thanks for the $100 plane ride, Pop, but I much, much prefer it here on the ground” overpowered my fear of jumping, and I made the suddenly easy decision to jump.

“Climb out the door and hang onto the wing,” the guide instructed me.

“Pass,” I commented.

“Climb out, and I’ll climb out after you.”

I got down on my hands and knees and inched my way out the door, holding on to the wing. I clung to that wing so tightly; I think a few of my fingernails are still attached. At this point, I decided that wearing a mere tank top and 1988-length shorts was not the smartest wardrobe selection for leaving the earth’s atmosphere. I was freezing. The instructor came out, straddled over me and snapped the belt to attach us at the waist.

“Let go of the wing, you’ll swing between my legs.”

“What are my other options?”

I let go and swung between his legs, looking again at the big blue space beneath me. I sat there swinging, not knowing when he was going to jump, when I was going to fall, or when I was going to wet my pants. Actually, I had a pretty good idea of when I was going to wet my pants.

Suddenly, I was falling. I felt my stomach fall all the way back to the earth and wait for me there, under a palm tree. Somewhere around the falling rate of 90 mph my adrenaline kicked in, and I started getting really excited. I felt immortal, like I had somehow, in this single act, conquered life. Life, I was fairly sure, would never mess with me again.

After several moments of falling at over 100 mph, the parachute opened and the overpowering noise from the wind disappeared. I was floating, peacefully, and I was in no hurry to land. All my senses were alive and they were having a “come as you are” party. I was the host. They loved me.

We got closer to the ground and I heard the instructor yell “Uh-oh.” This is never a welcomed announcement, but even less so when you are in such a vulnerable position.

“Uh-oh…start running – there’s no wind.”

“Huh?”

“There’s no wind to slow us down – we need wind to slow us down – we’re going to have to hit the ground running.”

Apparently there needs to be a strong wind to slow down the chute and land you gently on the ground. And we had no such wind. I hadn't taken physics, but I didn't see how “pre-running” was going to somehow store up a reserve of “running power” so that when you hit the ground you were actually ahead of the game because, hey, you were already running. But who was I to argue with Mr. Professional Skydiving Dude Man? I started Fred Flinstone-ing in the air. It made no difference. I hit the ground, landed on my face, and slid fifteen feet or so, with an instructor on my back.

We got up off the ground, shook off the dirt and the willies that come with sliding 15 feet with a grown man on top of you, and … hugged. It’s what dudes do, don’t you know. I then declared that I needed a drink, and the instructor informed me there was a hose behind the shed. I walked behind the shed to also find something the instructor failed to mention – a large crop of your average, garden-variety marijuana, flourishing in the tropical Hawaiian weather. That was very reassuring, I can tell you. My instructor may or may not have been stoned, whilst I put my young life in his dude-ish hands.

So, nice try, Dad. But I’m still here.

And for my final act, ladies and gentlemen...

In all of my 35 years on this planet, my closest brush with death came this past Saturday. Fact is, I hope it never gets any closer than that.

My friend Micah (names have not been changed) owns a couple of what the people in the biz refer to as “Quads” and invited me to go riding last Saturday morning. I had ridden a Quad one other time in my life, and that was for exactly three minutes, at exactly five miles per hour, with exactly one of my children riding with me. So when Micah asked me if I had been riding before, my immediate response was, “Of course, dude, what do I look like, a weenus?”

Micah picked me up around 7:00 a.m. and we drove up to Cold Creek, a site up the eastern side of Mount Charleston. We parked his Durango and unloaded the Quads from the trailer. Micah had a map of the mountain and some ideas of some pretty amazing areas to see. And truly, the mountain was fantastic – fall colors everywhere and not another living soul.

The air was crisp, and we had dressed for it. I had on several layers of clothing, gloves, a helmet, and eye goggles. In five hours time we had traversed about 18 miles and covered some pretty beautiful, yet treacherous terrain. Micah was no doubt duly impressed not only by my natural Quad-ing skills, but also with my fearless nature and rugged autumn jacket.

Less than half a mile from the peak of the mountain, we ran into a dead-end and decided to turn around and head back. The road we were on was gravely rather than rocky, and flat enough for us to pick up some speed.

I was trailing Micah and clipping along at about 40 mph when I came around corner into a cloud of dust and some compromised visibility. I should have slowed down, but figured I had accurate enough bearings to know I was fine. That’s when my vision cleared to see a 20-foot ravine directly in front of me.

I immediately applied the brake and turned the Quad away from the ravine, but with the speed and the sudden turn…I could feel the Quad tipping and getting ready to flip. Everything slowed down in my mind and the final thought that ran through my head was, “This is most likely it. You have control of nothing and you are going into the ravine.”

I don’t know how long I was unconscious, but when I came to, I couldn’t focus or hold a coherent thought in my head. My mind and my vision were both hazy and I felt like each time I tried to focus my brain would flip over, like it was unsuccessfully trying to balance itself. I wasn’t sure where I was or what exactly had just happened. I started to look around and noticed the Quad about 10 feet from me, sitting upright. I was lying near the bank of the ravine, but hadn’t gone over the edge. At this point I figured that I had just fallen off, and perhaps nothing too bad had happened.

I started to push my body off the ground and felt a sharp pain across my upper back between my shoulder blades and up through my neck. The left side of my body was in complete agony. I lay back down. I propped my head to look in the other direction. I don’t know if my helmet had been knocked off or if I took it off, but it wasn’t on anymore. I looked into the road and saw some rather large pieces of the Quad spread all over the place. It occurred to me at that point that the Quad had flipped at least once, if not more, and just happened to land upright.

I didn’t feel I could stand without toppling over, so I pulled myself up on the Quad and hunched over it. The only image I could spotlight for any length of time was my family. I kept seeing Katie’s face and the faces of my cute little children. And there was kind of this non-verbal motivation to be okay so I could be with them again. But that was it. No other images came into my mind; nothing else motivated me to do anything.

I knew Micah would eventually notice that I wasn’t behind him, then stop and wait for me, and when I didn’t come, he would come back. I don’t know how much time had passed, but soon I could hear his Quad coming up the hill.

I don’t recall much of our reunion, (or the next couple of hours), but I know that Micah kept trying to keep me mentally engaged. My answers were short.

“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know…”

“What happened?”

“I can’t really remember.”

“Should Harrison Ford really be making a fourth Indiana Jones movie?”

“I…can’t decide.”

We were miles from anybody, I wasn’t dead, and our only plan was to get safely down the mountain. I climbed on the back of Micah’s Quad and he started down. We were so far over the mountain from where we started that we were actually closer to Pahrump than Las Vegas. (Pahrump’s Motto: Land Of 1,000 X-Files Episodes.)

We rode about six miles when we happened upon a couple of guys unloading some Quads from their trailer. Well, one was unloading the Quads, the other toothless fellow was playing “Dueling Banjos” on his banjo and telling Micah he had a pretty smile.

Actually, body piercing aside, these were some very nice folks who didn’t hesitate for a second to load their Quads back up and drive us twelve miles into Pahrump. I don’t recall the trip down much, except that it was bumpier than I would have liked. I was having difficulty holding my head up and my breathing felt labored. I didn’t think my neck was broken, but it felt so vulnerable, the paranoid part of me was sure that all I had to do was turn my head wrong and I would be doing special tours at our nations’ high schools, talking from my wheelchair about how to have a positive attitude in the face of adversity.

They dropped us off at the Pahrump hospital. It was a Saturday, and it was Pahrump, so I’m sure they had their best veterinarian on hand to check me out. They put a neck brace on me, sat me in a wheelchair, and wheeled me back for some x-rays. I was in and out through it, and I’m glad, because the parts where I was awake were extremely painful. The x-rays showed no broken bones, much to my relief. So the vet wrote me out a prescription for Lortab and recommended I take it with two helpings of Alpo, for healthy teeth and a shinier coat.

Micah had called our friend Bob (again, names have not been changed) and asked him to come rescue us from Pahrump-a-pum-pum. Bob’s lovely wife joined the Extraction Team and dropped Bob off at Cold Creek to pick up Micah’s Durango and trailer. Bob then drove around the mountain to Pahrump, a 40-minute drive if you don’t stop at any of the five brothels greeting you at the entrance to Pahrump. (Bob made it in 45...but we gave him the benefit of the doubt.)

We went back up the mountain to retrieve what remained of the Quad I was driving. I waited in the car, but Micah and Bob put on their CSI baseball caps and started singing songs from The Who as they examined the crime scene with flashlights in daylight.

Micah wondered out loud how I didn’t, logistically, go into the ravine. And Bob commented that he had never seen anyone simply walk away from an accident that damaged a Quad so severely. At first I thought they were complimenting me on my deft ability to remain calm under intense pressure and my instinctual stuntman reflexes. Then I realized they were saying that there had to have been some divine intervention and that I was very fortunate to only be severely banged up.

After a long drive, Micah and Bob, my personal heroes, dropped me off at home and I immediately called dibs on our couch. Katie went out to pick up my Lortab and I actually put some finishing touches on a talk I was supposed to deliver at church the next day.

I took the Lortab and went to bed, but then woke up at 3 a.m. to throw said Lortab right up and out of my already aching body. I tried Motrin, and it seemed to be milder on my stomach.

Yesterday I left the house long enough to go the doctor, and the good doctor said I have a concussion and that it will probably take 4 to 8 weeks for me to completely mend. There is some extensive bruising and swelling up the left side of my body, but because of how much clothing I was wearing, the only significant loss of skin was on my left forearm, and one slash across my hip. I’ll be on the couch for the next couple of days, but I know the day is coming when I will physically be able to do whatever I want once again.

You don’t walk away from something like this without learning something, and I certainly have. I am still here because I have something to accomplish. Could be supporting my wife, could be raising my children, could be attending the opening night of Raiders of the Lost Ark IV. Some mysteries of life you never really figure out. But it’s nice that I still have some time to give it a shot.