Losing Sleep Parachute
Elenio Guardado
"Heart"(Spotify) is the fifteenth song (of 25) in my Atlas: Year Two series. The second song written for the theme "Intelligence": Body, Heart & Mind, inspired by the Enneagram Intelligence Centers. To learn more about this theme, and all of Atlas: Year Two's themes, please read here!
"Heart" opens with a secret - my 2 year old daughter, Lily whispering a heartbeat sound. She's obsessed with Doc McStuffins and will climb up on my wife or I at random to give us a "check up" - she assembles her doctor tools (she calls her toy stethoscope a "heartbeat") then she'll get very quiet while she uses her stethoscope and whispers "bum-bum, bum-bum, bum-bum" and then tell us we're all better. It's one of my favorite things in the universe, so I decided to record it, and made it the opening sound of this song.
As I mentioned in the "Body" how-it-was-made post, for all 3 of these "Intelligence" songs, I wanted to make sure my little family was well represented in each, so along with Lily's opening "heartbeat", the song closes with recordings of my wife's heartbeat, our two little girls heartbeats and my own, all playing simultaneously as the song ends. This song is bookended by my family's heart.
At its heart, "Heart" is a love song. It's about being vulnerable and letting ourselves be in love and unafraid - a reckless abandon of sorts.
In my marriage, we're always switching roles, constantly taking turns leading or following each other. I'm so grateful for that partnership, that when I'm losing my footing, she's pulling the parachute cord.
Jumping out of a hot-air balloon was my dream ever since I started skydiving. I was so happy to hear that it will be offered at this year's boogie at my local dropzone! I did not have to think twice about that. The night before the jump I did not get much sleep. I had to get up at 4:00am to meet the others two hours later. It was six of us: four jumpers, one guest and the pilot. We took our gear and drove to the starting point. It was chosen according to the wind conditions, having the highest chance of flying over our dropzone. One can't steer a hot-air balloon at all, so we had to hope for the best. Setting up the balloon took us about 20-30 minutes. We geared up quickly and took off. At first, I felt the wind blowing. After gaining some forward speed the wind noise stopped. We admired the beautiful sunset and waited for our exit point.
Unfortunately the wind direction changed a few kilometers before our dropzone. We knew that we would never reach it. After discussing our options, we decided to land on a small field near a country road, so the ground team could pick us up. We had to leave the balloon two people at a time, otherwise the balloon would shoot up in the air after losing too much weight at once. The first group jumped simultaneously. After a five seconds delay both parachutes opened perfectly.
I expected to spin over due to the dead air, but my body position was perfect right away. The plan was to pull 5-10 seconds after the exit, leaving enough time and space for my partner to open his parachute safely. In fact, I pulled after 3 seconds as I was told later. Then I waited for the usual drag caused by an opening parachute. In freefall at 200 km/h it takes just a moment. But here in dead air it felt like an eternity. Just as I wanted to look back to check if something was wrong I felt the known drag and watched my parachute open. Now was the time to scream for joy! The jump was not over yet, though. I had to land on a field surrounded by a river, railway lines, roads and buildings. There was no margin for error.
Pro skier Matthias Giraud, 26, was the the first to ski B.A.S.E jump off Mt. Hood, Telluride's Ajax, and southwestern Colorado's Engineer Mountain. With his trademark charm-your-pants-off French accent, he dishes about managing fear, losing his mentor Shane McConkey, and how to take the leap yourself.
Matthias Giraud: I've been cruising all over the Northwest and hitting all the cool spots along the way. I just jumped off a 700-foot radio tower antenna in eastern Washington at night, then I went to Seattle. I had some epic days on Mt. Baker and Mt. Hood, then I had a call from some friends who were going to go jump a cliff near Stevens Pass, so I got four hours of sleep, jumped in the car and next thing you know, I'm standing on top of 370-foot cliff with a parachute on.
I've been focusing on first ski descents and first ski B.A.S.E. jumps. It's been a lot of fun to be able to ski something and you know you're the first person to do it. The fear factor is way higher but it's really exciting.
Why do it? I mean, why not do it? It's the coolest thing you can do, literally. You are jumping off things and plummeting to your death but then you fly away with a little piece of nylon. Skiing is so great by itself, then you put the two sports together, and it's all even better. You can ski things no one else can ski. With a parachute, all of the sudden these impossible lines are survivable.
What I love the most about it is that it allows you to ski the fastest you would probably ever ski and really get to that point of no return. And when you think you're skiing as fast as you can and the edge of the cliff is only 100 feet away, you point it and go even faster. The last thing you know, you hit that edge and you're flying 100 or 200 feet away from the wall before you can pull your parachute. You're flying in mid-air. I think a lot of people are kind of bashing ski jumping. They say 'oh it's not skiing.' Well, it's more skiing than skiing would ever be. You're pushing skiing as far as it can be, you're going as fast as you can, as long as you can, then you get a cool parachute ride out of it, too. You look at the line you just skied and you go 'oh my god, it's outrageous, not in my wildest dreams did i think i could ski something like that and come out of there in one piece.'
It is. I'm not going to lie. Before each jump I'm absolutely terrified. I have to push myself to do it. You have to be in that Zen mode and tell yourself 'everything's ok, you've got it, you've done this before.' You've got to be really focused. But as soon as you drop in and start making a few turns, it's just another day skiing.
Ski B.A.S.E. jumping is more skiing than B.A.S.E. jumping. You've got to be able to ski gnarly terrain clean and fast and stick it. I grew up racing in the Alps. My coach would set up a GS course where he would take us in the forest, then you'd have to do GS turns through a mogul field, then he'd put a kicker in the middle and be like, yeah you have to go 360 on that. He was crazy! At first we were like 'you're out of your mind!' but then we were doing that for fun. Once you're comfortable skiing really fast, you start jumping cliffs. You hit five and then ten and then 15 and then 30. After that, if you want to get into ski B.A.S.E. jumping, do a bunch of sky diving. Get about a hundred sky dives, then find someone willing to teach you to B.A.S.E. jump or take a B.A.S.E. course. Once you feel comfortable and you get a good understanding of how this sport works, with the wind and the types of objects you jump and all that, it's time to go ski B.A.S.E. jumping. But nobody can tell you when you're ready for that. It's very personal.
Shane was the first B.A.S.E. jumper I ever met. We were talking almost every week before he died. He was giving me a lot of advice, even personally, like simple questions like how do I get life insurance? We were always kind of helping each other out. But I think everyone in the ski industry felt like Shane was their new best friend. His accident really affected a lot of us. Some people took a step back, but I was like *%$# that. He wouldn't want us to be reckless, but he'd want us to keep going out there to try new things. The day after his memorial, I jumped Ajax in Telluride. The first B.A.S.E. jumper gets to name the cliff, so I named it after Shane. It's a gnarly cliff and a sketchy jump and Shane would have loved it.
I have some first descents and jumps planned but I don't want to jinx myself, you know? I'm going to Iceland and Norway, France, the Alps, Switzerland, and Italy to do some B.A.S.E. jumping and wingsuit flying. You know, keeping the traveling circus going.
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