Rawane's 21st: Words fall short ... from the sky.

August 15, 2010:

We woke up at 7 am with all the excitement in the world ready for our day. We had to be in Gransee, which is 30 mins outside Berlin, at 9 .

We get there on time all hyped up and energized. The lady at the counter was very sweet and very friendly. We then found ourselves a nice sofa on the porch of the cafeteria and had a small breakfast. The weather was getting bad. Clouds were all over, wind got stronger, and it was about to rain. We decided to wait for a couple of hours to see if it will change, even if slightly. And so we waited. One of us fell asleep on the couch, another one made friends with the people around, and the third one was fighting with 2 dogs over a volley ball.

So yea, the wait was pleasant for most.

It was getting too late, and we wanted to go back to have lunch with Tala and so right when we were almost going to leave, the weather starts to clear up. And the beautiful blue sky at us. The sun shines again. And they tell us that we are next to fly!

A WOO HOO!

Endless happy dances, and screams, and "yea!(s)", and "a woo hoo(s)".. so you can imagine how that went. We got in our suits with a dance move with our every gesture, and we met our extremely cool and friendly tandem jumpers.


We were so happy at the thought of what we were about to do. It didn't seem very real while were on the verge of getting on the plane. We got in and there was that feeling inside of us that hadn't touched us yet, it hadn't moved us yet, or played with our guts yet. It was still sitting comfortably, still resting, until the plane started to take of. And slowly our hearts started to beat faster than normal but not too fast for us to follow. And our minds started to wander around looking at the reality we were in but unable to fully comprehend the situation. It was too surreal. We sat there, eyes wide open, like new born babies looking at the world for the first time. We sat there amazed at every cloud we went into, every meter we went higher up, every look on each others faces, and every breath we were taking. As we went higher, our hearts started beating faster, our minds were losing track of the real, and that feeling wasnt too comfortable anymore.

We went up and up and altough we were just sitting in the plane, nothing isnide of us was anywhere close to sitting still. On the inside it was a whole different story: a kids playground, where everyone is screaming and running from place to place, bumping into things and each other, laughing, screaming, cheering... Everything on our inside was playing, as we sat still the whole 4000 m.

And then, and now follow me on this one because it happens faster than it being read, or written, or talked about. It happens too fast that even after, as you sit back and try to recollect it in your memory you can't directly remember it all because of how much happens in very little time.

4000 m high. The plane still in motion, opens its door too quickly and the first group just jumps.
They just jump. We are on a plane, in the sky, and they just jump. They jump into what felt like nothingness. Then the other group went. And then one after the other, they kept going and going and then Rawane, then Dania, then Me.

And we were falling between the clouds and they touched everything in us as we fell from one to the other; then we were turning, like the wind, with the wind, as the wind... this second we were falling from the sky. And no, it is not a combination of beautiful words to express an intense feeling, this time, it was real. Just as real as walking on grass, and swimming in the sea, and looking up to the sky. In this moment, our reality was us falling from the sky.

We were falling from an endless sky, and that in itself renewed us in so many ways.

And then we were in position, hands open wide, legs opend wide, hearts still missing, but open so wide ... and everything around us, and in us is telling us we are flying. But how can we just take that as a fact of our present? How can we just fully understand it when flying is a dream. People use it in songs, and in poetry to describe the undescribable. They use it when the are no other word to explain how strongly they feel, or how passionate they are about something. But to actually be living this dream, living the undescribable, living all this intensity, wasn't something we could understand.

Our hearts still no where to be found. We screamed, well Rawane was too scared to, but it felt like we were all screaming. Screaming because of the rush it gives, screaming for the world to hear that we are flying, screaming to release it all. That feeling that was comfortably sitting while we were on the plane, is now a fireworks of excitment and it can't sit still.

Still unable to believe where we are, still too surreal. We look around and there we are with the clouds. We look below and the earth is but a map, that looks flat from up above, from the sky, from where we are.

We were flying.

And then suddenly, they opened the parachute, and we glide. We are floating, over the earth, from the sky down, enjoying every second our heart pumps, every second we come closer to the ground, every second we realized that for us to come closer means we were once up high.


We are floating.

It was beautiful. Looking at the world from up there. Floating in air, just hanging around up in the sky. That which we think feels like flying is nothing to be compared to what it really feels to be flying.

Then we hit the ground, and we completely released ourselves. After challenging gravity, we gave ourselves to it when we landed. We released our bodies to the ground, to the grass, and just lay there. Our minds were still racing, our hearts all pumped out, our eyes in awe, our spirit still high up, and our bodies were just shaking.

We lay on the grass, looked up, remembered where we were, captured that scene, closed our eyes, and tried to recollect every second of it to keep it with us, to carry it with us, to be able to always remember it.

We try to save this moment in our hearts, in our minds, and in our bodies. That moment that marked us. That moment that gave us absolute freedom. That moment that brought us to the sky and released us from it. That moment that will forever be changing us.


We always want to remember that we were once flying high up in the sky.



To Rawane. On your birthday.
Wish you are always given moments like these.
We will always remember this.
We will always remember us.