Tip Toe Through the Treetops

Last Sunday I went to TreeGo. TreeGo is an extremely challenging series of acrobatic obstacles up high in the trees. Since they opened last year, I not only wanted to go and do it...I felt compelled to do it.

To start, you are oriented to the harness and equipment. There is no worry of falling. It is impossible. My fear was not actually falling...my fear was falling and then attempting to get back up. You need a tremendous amount of upper arm strength to do this. Thank goodness I had no idea what I was in for!!

To look at the pictures posted on Face book by others, everyone is smiling and laughing and appear to be having the time of their lives. That is bullshit! Or...the pictures were taken very early on in their journey. If there was video footage of my journey...you would have been exposed to a grown woman trembling and pissing her pants in fear!

So, like skiing, the trails are marked according to difficulty. You 'graduate' from the easiest to the hardest. At first, I was smiling and giggling like a school girl. So was my husband... but he'd kill me if he knew I told the world about it! LOL! I was expecting a few ladder climbs and zip lines. This was not the case. There was a series of high wires, rickety old ladders, logs and hung by chains and swaying this way and that. This swing scared the BEJESUS out of me. As a control freak, it was even more challenging to just step on a swing and be zipped across a wire to the next post about 40 feet above the ground! This picture may look like I am laughing...but I am screaming my lungs out!

The best and WORST moments of this day occurred at the exact same times throughout the course. I encountered 2 ladders and a reverse zip line that made me feel like I was going to die! I found myself at 'almost' the top of a ladder with not one ounce of arm or hand strength to carry on. I couldn't step down and I couldn't get up. I screamed ' please Jesus help me!!!!!!' in absolute hysteria panic and terror. I was in a place in my head that was VERY dark. Can you imagine...seconds before dying (perceived dying) that the last thought you would ever think would be " you big ass fat COW! This wouldn't be happening if you weren't such a big-fat-pack-a-day-smoking-f#$%^&'n-COW!" This is sadly...exactly what I was thinking. I was so mad at myself for even thinking at 258 pounds that I could do this. I was enraged that I allowed myself to get this fat and unhealthy. I was really devastated that I keep on thinking that I will really stick to my diet TOMORROW! Well, in my terror...tomorrow wasn't coming. I finally had to face the reality that if I was hanging on for my life on the edge of a cliff...I would have to let go and die. Period. BUT, I did not QUIT!

I am constantly reminded by people that I am an adventurous woman. My mother said I should have been the boy in our family because I have BIG BALLS. I love change, I love challenge. I have had the privilege of being in the military and doing the military obstacle courses, tear gas huts, being called "RAMBETTE" shooting sub machine guns on the firing range, cooking for 'green-colored' sailors out on rough seas, firefighting, sinking ship SIMS, and so much more! I have seen and done many wild things in the short course of my life. I will sign up to do just about anything! I didn't really have a clue that some of the things I do are viewed as such a big deal ...until the e mails came flooding in from people who adamantly refuse to do such a thing!

At TreeGo, I could have screamed for help. I could have had the firefighters come and rescue me like a kitten in the trees. I could have stopped on a perch in the trees and cried. Looking back, in my sheer terror moments, quitting never crossed my mind. Not once. The only way to go was forward. Every time I got to the top of the next ladder, next perch, next challenge... I did not hesitate to keep going. In retrospect, this really surprised me about myself. I was thrilled and elated that I completed this self-induced tortuous challenge! Now, if only I could get a grip on this weight thing!

"Whether you think you can or whether you think you can't, you're right."- Henry Ford

Lynn

;)