Valerie00diamond - Untitled

I’ll teach you to jump on the wind’s back and then away we go.

- J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

‘Those who don’t jump will never fly’ is a dictum drilled into me from an early age. It’s one I took literally when I learned when parachuting and then later dabbled in sky diving, well before I went into the British army as a combat pilot.

Skydiving provides a unique combination of adrenalin-fuelled exhilaration and perfectly calm tranquillity. While in free fall it’s all about the rush - but once the parachute opens and your heart rate steadies, you’ll take a moment to gaze around you and see the whole world in a new light. It’s beautiful up there, and the experience is about as close to actual flying as humans can actually get.

To the skydiver, ‘flying’ in a plane is akin to ‘swimming’ in a boat. As someone who has flown helicopters I would quible with that simple characterisation but eventually I’m okay to acknowledge there is some truth behind it.

As someone who used to parachute and sky dive as a recreational past time, I can empathise with those skydivers who live for the wind whipping past as they plummet toward the earth during free fall, and the thrill of floating on the air currents once their ‘chutes are safely open. They live on the edge, though not in danger - amid the elements, but not at their mercy.

In skydiving, it is the fear response that gradually weakens. During the precipitous descent, the amply tested parachutist can savour the thrill rather than endure the panic. You may never get rid of the butterflies, but you can teach them how to fly in formation.

"I am, I am, I am", Tathev Simonyan

Squamish, British Columbia, Canada

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We're so fucking lucky.

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Oh and of course us

Honourable mention

Salmon hats: sweeping the nation by storm watercolor on paper, digitally overlaid on photo

Endangered Species -- KnowBC - the leading source of BC information

"ENDANGERED SPECIES are species of plants, animals and plant communities considered to be in imminent danger of extinction or extirpation in BC."

"These include road building and other forms of access and disturbance; LOGGING, MINING, urban, recreational and HYDROELECTRIC developments; grazing and AGRICULTURE; the introduction of exotic or alien species that displace native species (see KNAPWEED, for example); poaching; human-caused fires; widespread air and water pollution; and CLIMATE change. Provincial wildlife authorities consider access and loss of habitat to be the 2 most important factors in the decline of wildlife populations."

Trump is appointing three washed-up actors as "ambassador to Hollywood" in order to bring back the "Golden Age of Hollywood". Which has historical precedent: there was an ambassador to Hollywood in the Golden Age, too. His name was Georg Gyssling and he was sent by Hitler to monitor the activities of Hollywood studios. To make sure their films didn't say anything anti-Nazi, resulting in many attempts at anti-fascist films being shut down by the Hays Code. Just a fun historical Hollywood fact there

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