Good to the Last Drop

I’ve been thinking about skydiving lately, this after seeing a spectacular video of a friend’s jump in early June. The tape captured the thrill and exhilaration of the experience like nothing I’d ever seen; that, I thought, is something I need to do.

Now, after reading about David Winoker, I’m not so sure.

Winoker and instructor Alexander Chulsky died Friday after their chute failed to open. This was one of those tandem jumps that most first-timers take. Being strapped to some stranger must feel a little weird, but I suppose you forget all about it when you jump out of the plane.

That’s the tragic part, now here’s the terrible part: according to news reports, Winoker was not so keen on this adventure. No, it was not some crazy middle-aged lark that drove him to take the leap, it was his wife. From the NY Post:

“He never said no to me. Maybe this time, he should have said no,” a heartbroken Jillian Winoker said of husband David at his packed Father’s Day funeral at a Westchester synagogue.

I find this an interesting twist. How many fiftyish men have tried to convince their wives that they want a motorcycle or fast car, or that they have an itch to embark on some sort of risky adventure? It’s usually the caution and careful wife who knows when to say no, for better or worse, for better or worse.

4 thoughts on “Good to the Last Drop

  1. My wife has often suggested that I jump out of a plane…funny thing, though, a parachute was never mentioned.. 😉

  2. Did your son go to Jump School as part of his training? It was required of us for ROTC, but I can’t imagine jumping willingly from a plane again. Three comrades from school washed-out, opting-out on the first static line jump. We could hear the instructor yelling at them over the roar of the engines as the plane was flying away. Never saw them again, not sure the instructor didn’t just push them out somewhere over Georgia.

    1. Alex is strictly a boots on the ground 11B — but I think he’s leap at the chance (ha!) to go to jump school. I find it interesting that he could have gone ROTC or OCS but chose to be a grunt. Go figure…

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