have you ever had to choose between your 'job' and skydiving? (i.e. stop diving or get fired)

[virgin-burner 1]

WTF are you still posting around here!!

go skydiving!!!

stuff the rowing! i can hear your heart screaming for it! if i'd follow the screams in my heart, i'd be close or over my 1000th skydive by now. check my numbers in my profile!

i really like this little poem that's quite well known, maybe, you like it too!

man small.
why fall?
skies call.
thats all!

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[Emu 0]

dude, fuck the skydiving . Racing at worlds/olympics is cool.

[Broke 0]

Quote

how?

well it was b=pretty crazy actually.

I am on the adaptive team (we are wheelchair athletes)
this National rowing federation brought us to their heavyweight womens trainining location.
which is not wheelchair accessible.
28 athletes in wheelchairs
at a non accessible day.


on that first day, 4 fell out of their chairs,
i was the one who did the double backflip and landed on my head.
(the others falls were not so spectacular... )
regardless, apparently i was knocked out,
and thus the concussion issue kept me off the water until the coaching staff had a letter from a doc to say that i had no symptoms of concussion anymore.

a month later i still did not pass the sport concussion assessment tool -didn't pass the neurological sector either... so another month off the water for the national adaptive team purposes
strangely the canoe/kayak did not use the same criteria and thus i was kayaking about 5 hrs/day 6 days/wk.

i cant see any reason really for a rower to get a concussion either...
unless your wheelchair goes flipping backwards down a path into the bush.. thankfully I didn't have the oars with me.

And they say that skydiving is dangerious

Divot your source for all things Hillbilly.
Anvil Brother 84
SCR 14192

[Andy9o8 2]

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I have signed an athletec ontract with a national sport organization with the national adaptive rowing team program....

I only needed to read that far and I already knew my answer. Those that said the team has the right to protect its investment are correct. It's a contract, and you are the product - a commodity, not unlike pork bellies. And I'm not saying that tongue-in-cheek. You want the contract? Man up, abide by their conditions, and don't whine. Welcome to the adult world.

[virgin-burner 1]

contracts can be terminated. if your boss gets tired of you, he sacks you. welcome to the real world!

“Some may never live, but the crazy never die.”
-Hunter S. Thompson
"No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."
-Yoda

[gimpboogie 0]

Quote

Quote

I have signed an athletec ontract with a national sport organization with the national adaptive rowing team program....

I only needed to read that far and I already knew my answer. Those that said the team has the right to protect its investment are correct. It's a contract, and you are the product - a commodity, not unlike pork bellies. And I'm not saying that tongue-in-cheek. You want the contract? Man up, abide by their conditions, and don't whine. Welcome to the adult world.

that's the problem,
I don't know where the 'world' starts in this all.

last yr, when they wanted me to stop the skate parks and kitewing,
i did.
they banned me off rowing due to the concussion i got at the training facility.
so i went skydiving.
their words were something about not having seen me so happy in my life -as in the sky diving photos they saw.

they did not speak then of the sky diving,
perhaps because i was banned off the water anyways?
i went and kayaked instead_to the worlds sprint trials in Rochester for adaptive races in sacramento next summer, if i choose to train for it.
now comes back to the rowing.
i am under this contract currently, which iam fullfilling because im not in the skatepark, on the kitewing or even sky diving for that matter.
this contract ends this month.
there is a new one.
my coach said i didnt need to worry about it for now,
to wait until later when he gives them to us for signing.
if i sign another one, i am bound by it, like i have been this yr.

if i don't sing it, and do not row..
i can do as i please.
there is a feeling of 'social responsibility' to do certain things, like go to kayak or go to row
and train... im sort of responsible for starting these programs and clubs here and we have a strong rec program and one other paralympic rower to be coming up strong...
the program will thrive without me.
it has to.
because i wont live long enough to do anything useful for the program now,'except perhaps try to hang in another year
row one more year and kayak one more year
then i do not know if i am able to move enough to do it after that.(ALS takes muscles away and eventually we all die from not being able to breathe.. )

so,
the point where i have the problem is at the point of figuring out wether i should have signed on for another year (if they would have me, they could decide that last yr was my last yr of being competitive enogh in their eyes.. i have no idea what the organization eventually decides once they get the signed athlete agreements.. they decide whom they want to keep after that... )
or if i should go and live my life
for myself now from now on....
and learn to sky dive like i planned
before Angus has to tow my ass around the skies again.


i'm deciding to go sky diving this year.
and not signing another athlete agreement.
not committing myself to anything that i might regret.

the fact that the national rowing org. has support for the notion that a sport psych. is talking to me about finding goals for myself in life....
to finding enjoyment in sport outside of competition,
speaks meaningfully.

sometimes i do feel like its a tough spot to decide on,
and given the circumstances of my life,
i don't like rowing enough to go to my grave doing it....
yet i love competing, and training....
which i have little muscular strength for now,
in comparison to last yr.
last yr it was no trouble to bench press 140 lbs
now i do not have the handgrip strength to bench press anything safely.
it's been extremely enlightening to think of these things, via learning of others opinions, thoughts, considerations....

in the end,
i do not like it that the choice is to row another yr and see what is left after that,
or go with my heart follow my dreams now
and if life ends before the next summer arrives'
i'll be glad i went with my heart.


thanks to all who wrote...
and who PM'd me also.
thanks,

i'm going to sky dive this summer,
and retire from competition for this season coming up.... i see the writing on the wall well enough now,
-minna

To become active member in the Bonus Days Club you must very narrowly escape eternal freefall ... one exciting time.)-Pat Works

[vidiot 0]

Would they allow you to ride horses?

There has been a recent scientific study showing that skydiving is less dangerous than riding a horse.

Let me know if you need details,
Klaus

My Logbook

[Andy9o8 2]

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contracts can be terminated. if your boss gets tired of you, he sacks you. welcome to the real world!

Actually, no. Unless it simply expires at the end of its term, an employment contract can only be terminated (a) by mutual agreement of the parties, or (b) for cause.

If your boss can sack you if he's tired of you, that's called "employment at will", which in layman's terms basically means being employed without a contract.

[riggerrob 643]

When you put it in that light: fixed number of years left on this planet ... and you have gotten as far as you can with rowing ... then forgoing a rowing contract to pursue skydiving makes sense.