To Jump or Not to Jump

I was working with my friend Mark and cousin Kerry one hot & muggy morning back in the summer of 1988. We were picking up the trash at an army guard camp about 30 minutes from home. 

We were almost finished working when we noticed the river on the East side looked a little too refreshing to pass up. So we pulled the truck over and took a short walk to the river bank. After all, we had earned a cooling off and were almost done working. 

Now this river is known to not be very deep. You can see sandbars for miles up and down the river. But we didn’t know how deep the water was right off the bank. And water is always moving faster than it looks. 

Our plan was to jump in, swim out to a sandbar, cool off and head home. But the current kept messing with us. “How deep do you think it is,” asked Mark. “I don’t think it’s very deep,” replied Kerry. “Should we go for it,” I asked. And then we’d stand there pondering what to do. We’d throw rocks in and try to touch the bottom with a stick but to no avail. Then we’d go back through the questions.  

After several minutes of pondering, and I mean several, probably twenty minutes, we decided to go for it. All the while the truck was idling because we weren’t going to be in the water very long. We nervously jumped in the water and started swimming to the closest sandbar. Then it happened. What we figured all along but weren’t 100% positive about was confirmed. After a couple of strokes our knees hit the bottom of the river. Then we started laughing about being so worried about how deep it was and getting swept away. So we stood up and walked the rest of the way out to the sandbar.  

All of the anxiety and worry about how deep the water was and getting swept away was for nothing really. We knew the river wasn’t deep but the doubt kept creeping in and then we would feed off each others doubt. Which made it even worse. But like most things it came down to risk vs. reward and reward won. We overcame our fear, went for it and had a great old time. Until we had to explain to my grandpa why we were gone so long. As typical teenagers we forgot that we had taken his car to work. But my cousin got blamed for that so no biggie. 

So the next time you really want something and you’re wondering if you can make it, wondering if you should go for it, but you know in your heart of hearts, your soul of souls that you can. That the fear and doubt is all in your head. Go for it. You won’t be sorry that you did. Even if you are there’s a lesson to be learned.