Cliff Diving

I am not fond of the snarky modern commentary, but I wanted the true Wide World of Sports effect, not the modern versions. "Spanning the Globe..."

It was one of those annual WWS events, like ski jumping even in non-Olympic years, or the Harlem Globetrotters touring in the Ural Mountains, or log-rolling and tree-cutting events from the upper midwest.

There are young people jumping off the Singer Bridge in Pinardville these days.  The railing maxes at 27 feet, but they stack up some milk crates to get to 31'. Every time I walk past them on my Rail Trail hikes I am tempted to bring a bathing suit next time and jump myself. I'm not playing around with any milk crates because of the danger of bad footing and falling backwards, but twenty-seven feet isn't that much.  I did double that in the 1960's, having gradually worked my way up from 14' to 55'. Diving was supposedly okay if you held your palms in a certain way to "break the water" before your head went in.  I must not have gotten that right, as I tried it at 21' and had a headache for 24 hours after and never tried again.

It was all young boys jumping.  One girl, and one man about forty-five.  That is the same pattern as when I was young.  I thought myself quite precocious for jumping from 55' at 13, but in retrospect, by eighteen years old the boys were mostly just hanging out with girls, and the few adults there mostly just wanted to drink beer near the shallow end. I shudder at the risky climbs, over hard stone, not water, that I regarded as normal at the time. What was I thinking?

Answer:  Teenage boy.  Thinking.  The Venn Diagram of that intersection is small.