The rain came down slowly, but no one seemed to mind. For the most part, it had been a sunny, three-day weekend at Big Pine Key campground, so a little rain while we were packing up to leave was just fine. I stopped what I was doing for a moment and stared at the black and gray clouds as they passed quickly over the short, choppy waves. My son and I had just spent a great weekend of fishing, snorkeling, and camping. It felt good to spend time with him. He was sitting at the picnic table and he seemed distracted, obviously in a world of his own. I walked over to him and asked, “What’s on your mind, son?”
To my surprise, he answered, “Dad, I want to jump off the bridge before we go.”
Our tent had been set up right beside a small canal leading out into the ocean. Just beyond the entrance to the canal was an old bridge. It had been abandoned and put out of service so a higher, safer one could be built. In order to allow boats to pass under it, a large portion of the old bridge had been cut away. This left a perfect spot to jump off the thirty-foot high platform into the warm, salty water below. The other two teenagers with us had jumped off the bridge quite a few times, but my son never mentioned a desire to follow suit. In fact, it never even crossed my mind that he would because he was never one to take chances.
I tried not to hide my surprise, “Are you sure?”
“Yeah Dad, I’m sure.”
Thinking quickly, I yelled over to one of the other teenagers on the trip, “Hey Evan, you want to jump off the bridge?”
“I don’t think so, I just got my finger wrapped up.” I forgot that he had cut his finger badly the night before.
“How about you John?”
“No, I don’t really feel like it.”
I looked back at my son and saw the disappointment in his face. He spoke to me in a quiet voice, “You can jump with me Dad.”
Immediately my muscles tensed up. The last time I had tried to jump into the water from a high distance was a few years earlier when the whole family went to Weeki Wachee Springs. We had stopped the boat along the river where an oak tree hung over a deep spot. Evan and his dad, David, immediately scaled the tree and jumped into the water. Not wanting to be left out, I climbed up the wooden slats and made my way to the place where hundreds of other jumpers had obviously stopped many times before. Right between two large limbs that branched out to the left and right, there was a naturally formed platform. It was the ideal location for jumping into the icy water below. I stood there for a few seconds and stared at the quickly moving water below. Before long, my head started to swim and I started to wonder what I was trying to prove. I was brought out of my stupor by cheering voices below. Everyone was yelling for me to jump, but my mind was telling me to climb back down the tree. Feeling a bit uneasy, I sat down on the platform and let my legs dangle in the air. That only proved to increase my uneasiness. I’m not sure how long I debated it, but I finally made up my mind to jump. With all my courage summoned up, I pushed off the tree. Almost immediately, I changed my mind, and attempted to grab onto the limb that was extended out to the right. My body swung sideways and I felt the rough bark of the oak tree as it scraped my arms. Unfortunately, my muscles were no match for the entire weight of my body and the law of gravity quickly proved itself. It wasn’t like I fell from the limb. It was more like I was flung from it. I flew off the limb and never managed to straighten myself out, smacking into the water hard with the right side of my body. The pain was like a thousand needles piercing my skin all at the same time. I came out of the experience with some scrapes on my arms, a massive red mark on my left side, and a bruised ego. It was however, one of the most laughed about things from the trip.
I had no plans to repeat this scenario and once again asked Evan and John if they would jump with my son. The answer still came back no. I thought about the situation that was in front of me. This was a monumental moment in the life of my child. He had never wanted to take a risk like this before. Was I going to squelch his spirit because of my own fears? I looked at him and saw the excited look in his eyes. Right then, I knew what I had to do.
David took us out to the bridge in his boat. He pulled up close to it and then we stepped onto the wet concrete. We both held onto the sides and slowly made our way to the top. Once we got there, I turned around and saw that David had pulled the boat to the other side of the channel to get a better look. The bridge itself was about twenty feet wide. There was probably fifteen feet from where we were standing to the end of it. The tide was going out and I could see the strong current as it moved the dark water swiftly out to sea. With a panicky feeling in my chest, I asked him one more time if he was sure he wanted to jump. To my dismay, he said yes.
There was a brief moment of silence as we faced the water and surveyed the scenery in front of us. Finally, we agreed upon a plan. We would stand on different sides and at the count of three both of us would take off running and jump at the same time. He got on the left side and I got on the right. We got into position and I started counting. “One”. My heart began to pound and I could see him out of the corner of my eye as he stood there anxiously. Even with the rain that was falling, I felt a small bead of sweat break out and run down my eyebrow. My throat began to swell up and I started gearing myself up for the jump. “Two”. Suddenly, I saw him take off running. Before I even knew what happened, he had bolted to the end of the bridge and jumped off, splashing into the moving water below. In what seemed like a second, he was swimming out to meet David at the boat. I shook my head in disbelief and did what any sensible father would do. I clenched my fists together, threw them in the air and yelled, “Woo Hoo!” Then, without hesitation, I carefully walked back down to the bottom of the bridge, jumped in the water and then swam out to the boat to congratulate him. When I got there, he was beaming with excitement and insisted on doing it again. This time, he was happy and willing to climb to the top by himself.
It’s true, I never jumped off the bridge, but I learned a valuable lesson that day. I couldn’t make the jump for my son, but I had a big part in getting him to the place he needed to be in order to accomplish the task. He would not have jumped if I hadn’t taken the time to climb up to the top of the bridge with him. Because of that, he was able to overcome his fears and do something that he never would have done before. The bad thing is that I tried to pawn it off on someone else. As parents, we need to remember that children need us to support them and believe in them. We have a responsibility to lead them to the places in their lives where they can take off and accomplish great things. Unfortunately, some of us are too scared or too busy and we end up allowing someone else to step in and do the job for us. I never want to look back and say that I wasn’t there for my kids. I always want to know that I did everything possible to help them grow into strong, responsible adults. Maybe… just maybe, one day, I’ll ask my son to take me to the top of the bridge again. And this time we can jump off together.
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