The Story behind the pictures.

The first photo is Florrie's grand-nephew and niece.

Lew asked me to tell this story to our boating friends.  On September 29th I drove to Maine to surprise my niece for her 50th Birthday.  
It was a terrific surprise but the real adventure occurred the next day.  Betsy and her 20 year old son, Shane, were scheduled to take their first sky dives, as a joint Birthday celebration.  Rick (Betsy's husband) and I went along to watch. It was fascinating to listen to the instructor, Scott, a diver with over 10,000 jumps, talking to the 6 new jumpers.  

We waited hours for the clouds to clear.  Then we waited for the 40 MPH winds 5000 feet up to calm down. 

Scott, on the left, and the other tandem divers waited around, too.  I asked the divers if it is always such an adrenalin rush to jump.  Absolutely!  But the diver in the stocking cap told me that the most scared he has ever been was on a boat in a storm! These guys pay money to jump out of planes as often as they can, but a boat on the water is worse?!  (All of a sudden I didn't feel like such a chicken.) 

Finally Scott and one of the other pros went up in a small plane to "test" the winds. 

I AM SOOOOOO GLAD that the first time I ever saw anyone jump it was NOT Betsy or Shane!!!!!  They were up so high we couldn't even see the plane or the divers until they opened their chutes - and THEN they were PIN DOTS!!!!  Pretty quickly they became about as big as the head of a pin.  Scott had\s lost count of his dives at 10,000.   It takes 20 tandem dives before someone is allowed to jump alone.  I am impressed.  It was still too windy so we waited around for another hour or two, then Betsy & Shane got rain checks for another jump within the next 2 years.  I don't have plans to watch - but who knows?

When it is done right - the landing is quite awesome.

(Pardon the  amateur entries! - Florrie)