That less-than daring young woman on the flying trapeze.

Somehow, I have found myself once again standing on the edge of a rickety platform, staring down at the ground far below, waiting to fall.

It’s starting to seem like a recurring nightmare, isn’t it? Except of course, that once again, I’ve put myself in this situation.

My friend Alyson has been taking various types of acrobatics classes at Hollywood Aerial Arts for a while now. She has primarily been working on hoop and tissue – in which she beautifully spins herself around while hanging from a hoop, or weaves herself in and around long tissuey curtains suspended far above the ground at angles that seem impossible. It’s quite beautiful.

Wanting to join in her enthrusiasm, she invited a group of friends to join her at a trapeze class. After the success of my zip-lining expedition, I was eager to continue to challenge my fear of heights and I accepted the invitation. Jesse, Katy, and Alyson’s friend Tiffany also decided to participate. Ironically, Alyson is injured on the day of our trapeze class.

(Yeah, that's right. These are all of Alyson injured.)

During the course of the class, the instructors guide you through learning proper form, then they teach you a simple turning dismount. If you’re doing well, by the end of one class you might go on to learn some tricks while swinging on the bar. You might even get as far as releasing yourself from the bar and swinging yourself through the air so that George (one of the instructors) can catch you. Pretty impressive for a couple hour’s work. . . if you can get that far.

Katy and Tiffany have prior gymnastics training, and learned pretty quickly. They picked up the movements as if they were no big deal at all. I’m sure it was more difficult for them than I am making it sound, but from my vantage point they looked amazingly graceful and strong while swinging in the air and flipping themselves around the bar.

Tiffany actually managed a catch, and Katy was nearly there.

Jesse didn’t get quite that far along, however, he rallied amazingly well and managed the flipping dismount quite admirably.

I was a whole other story. Just managing to get off the platform was an ordeal. Surprisingly, climbing up the interminable ladder was not all that bad. Just concentrate on the next wrung of the ladder and don’t look down. Stay focused and it’s manageable. Once you’re swinging through the air . . . well, that’s just fun. Like so many things, the hardest parts were the start, and to a lesser degree, the end.

For some reason, I experience the greatest disconnect between what I know to be rationally true in my brain and what’s going on in my body when I’m dealing with heights. G and I went to the CN Tower in Toronto a couple of years back. One of their attractions is the glass floor, which you can walk on and see the earth far below you. It isn’t even completely glass. It’s more like large glass tiles suspended in a matrix of steel rods. It looks very sturdy. You can look at it and plainly see that there is no possible way that you can fall through it. More over, it was a REALLY cloudy day. It pretty much just looked like you were stepping onto a white tile floor. Nonetheless, when I would even begin to slide my feet onto the glass tile, I’d immediately feel the vertigo-induced fallout in my stomach. I’d tiptoe onto the glass, then jump back shrieking. Then I’d run back and try it again. Yeah, I was suddenly 5 again.

Now imagine me standing on a narrow platform, toes hanging over the edge – no glass floor this time-- and being expected to lean far out in from to reach a bar that seemed eternally far from the edge. Sure, I know the spotters are there holding onto the harness around my waist so that I can’t fall until I’m ready to jump. Sure, my brain is telling me that even if I were to fall, I’m harnessed, and even then there is a net below to catch me. Sure, I know the bar isn’t really all that far out there. Just take a deep breath, reach out and take it. Somehow, there was NOTHING that could convince my right arm that any of this is true.

What followed was a similar argument with each of my limbs. Somehow I managed to get my right hand around the bar; now the left had to get there too. My left arm, desperately clutching to the side platform bar, refused to trust that right hand really had the situation under control.

“Stop shaking your leg,” I hear one the spotters tell me. I look down and see that my leg is in fact trembling violently. “I would if I could,” is my response. After what seems like an eternal struggle, both of my hands are on the bar.

Now all I have to do is jump. Just jump! Seems so simple. I bend my knees into a little squat, as instructed, and I hop . . . or so I thought. If you watch the YouTube video, you’ll see me doing what looks like a little booty dance. At this point, my brain swears I’m jumping! But somehow I’m going nowhere.

I do eventually manage to get off the platform, and miraculously my hands hold their grip, and for a few moments I’m flying through the air. This part is deliciously exhilarating. I mean, who doesn’t wish they could fly?

From below, the instructor, Ray, calls out commands that I try to follow. It takes a lot of concentration for me to hear him at all; asking my body to do what he’s saying takes even more concentration. Swinging your legs up and then back requires a good amount of core strength – a little more than I currently have. However, I could see that the real trick here is to just react to the commands being called out; to not think. This clarity was something I just could not manage that day, so swinging is as far as I got.

Why bother? Why put myself in this situation. I really don’t like being limited in this way. I try to fight against it. I used have a minor paranoia of driving on the freeways in LA. Literally. I once had an anxiety attack because G was going to force me to take the wheel on a drive to the OC. I eventually got over that paranoia through repeated exposure. I figure I can get over this too. I was really giddy to try this actually. I was a little surprised at how much the vertigo affected me that day– I thought I was little closer to having it under control. Apparently, it’s going to be a slightly longer battle than I expected.

Of course each jump got a little easier. Each person was given 5 turns during the class time. I wish I could say I took all five turns, but I was able to manage 3. The mental exertion got to me in the end, but it was getting easier. And I really appreciate that the instructors were nice enough not to give me a super hard time or force me into more than I wanted to do. Because of that I’d be willing to go back another day and give it another shot.

Ray waxed philosophic quite a bit about how the trapeze is such a clear metaphor for life, and I totally see that. Maybe I’m not all the way there yet, but some days just showing up is accomplishment enough. At the end of the day, taking the jump is the hardest part, and I jumped 3 times.

Check out 2 of my attempt attempt and everyone else's YouTube videos.
The one labeled Nikki 2, is actually attempt #1, and Nikki 1 is attempt 2