AKHGKJAHFGKJAHFGKJHAFGKJHi.
So I'm alive. Yippie! But Boot camp was fun and horrible. The horrible part was Repelling.
We're all at the bottom of this 100 foot clif, talking and listening to the intrustor Sgt. Jenkins about how to put on the harness (It looks like a thong of some sort, I need to get a pic of one). So we did, and we had to get our partners. I partnered up with Eric Arias, this guy from Jefferson High (I'm Jordan high), whom had been making on me all day. I can't tell when people are macking on me because well I play around like that alot with girls, so when guys do it it's just normal. Annnyway, Everyone's in line, people are scared to go up and down and stuff, and Eric says he wants to go first. So I said okay, and let him go hike up the mountain to the top of the cliff where my teacher's assistant 1SGT Henderson would grab your harness, tug a little, then strap your damits over onto the rope with an 8 knot and talk you through going down, especially the scary ones. So Eric gets on the rope, and I motivate him and shout up that he could do it cause he was scared a lil' bit. He gets down and the fucker goes "I wasn't scared a bit. In fact lemme go again Ma'am" and I told him no. We laughed and he told me to hurry up (I went to the wrong side of the hike path at first XD) and I got up there. I am not going to lie, I was scared SHITLESS. 100 feet in the air about to go down by a rope. My 1SGT sees me and smiles, then straps the next person in. My friend Alex Pozar was all "Hey Carmen, ready to become pancakes?" I yelled for him to shutup. XD Then my turn came along and him and my other friends were all "Bye Carmen, see you next fall." XD
So 1SGT seen the shaken up look on my face. He wasn't there my 9th grade year, but in 9th grade it took me 25 minutes to get down the mountain when it shouldn't take more than 2. So he straps me in and I woulndn't move at all. I was frozen. Then he chuckled and told me "Alright Carmen, just take baby steps and you can do it; it'll be alright." So I put my right hand behind my back holding the other part of the rope that I let rope off to go down, and my left on my support one. We take a good minute to get me about 5 feet down on it. "Elevate your feet with your eyes, you should be able to be looking dead at your feet Jones."
I was almost equal to my feet with my eye level when I felt a jerk. I looked down at myself. My seat came apart. I looked up wide eyed and screamed, "MY SEAT CAME APART -" as soon as I yelled that, my seat came straight off my whole body; the rope harness untangled and fell to the ground, 95 feet away. My feet slipped off the rocks and I fell half a foot, before grabbing the rope with my left hand. I hit the rocks with the side of my face, and screamed up, "FIRST SARGENT HELP ME!!!" I looked up paniced out to see if he heard me, and he looked dead into my eyes from the 5 ft distance. "Oh God. Hang in there Miss Jones!" He climbed on the rock and extended his hand out to me. He had on no harness, no helmet, not even a saftey line. I thought, "1SGT is crazy!" Suddenly, I heard him go "Whoa," and he slid off. Right off the mountain. I screamed "FIRST SARGENT GRAB MY ROPE!!" and he grabbed it. I fell a bit more due to the weight, but held on more. I felt my hand start to slip. "FIRST SARGENT I CAN'T HOLD ON!!" He climped up the rope and grabbed the rope next to me, and screamed to the others above, "GET ME A SAFETLY LINE! NOW!!" People below screamed and were scared. I hard a little laughing. He grabbed my waist and looked at it, and just smiled. "What happened now?" "My se-seat came aloose." He looks and nods. "Ahhh, I see. Wasn't put on right?" "I didn't put it on me, 1SGT. The medic did." "What? The medic?" "Uh huh." "...Well that's bizzare." He looked up and yelled again, "WHERE'S MY SAFETY LINE!?" I looked at his hand. From the fall it was cut up. "1SGT are you okay??" He smiled a big one at me. "...Are you?" I could feel my face heat up. I looked t my hand. I was holding on for dear life. But I realized I couldn't feel anymore pain in it. I just hung on like I was on a monkey bar or something.
FINALLY, the safetly line gets thrown down after 5 minutes. He grabs it and wraps it around my thighs and around my waist. He talked through it saying "Well I don't mean to be touching you in places I shouldn't, but you can't let go, so bear with me okay?" I laughed a little. Tears stormed down my face and my lip was shaking in fear mostly. Then he gave it a good yank to make sure it was in place, and my hand let go again. He gasped and dropped down faster to catch me, putting his hand up and grabbing the back of my thigh. I screamed now. I turned my head and screamed loud. He pushed my ass now. "GET UP THERE! TO AT LEAST THE SAFETY LINE!" "I CAN'T!!" "THAT'S NOT IN MY LANGUAGE, LEUTENNANT!" So I screamed the whole way, getting myself at least THAT high with his help. He let go of my belt and grabbed the safety. "THROW ME DOWN TWO HARNESSES!" he screamed. And they did, and he put one on himself and then on me. My arm was numb. I could feel nothing in it anymore. He then smiled and looked up "Okay, now throw me down a rope!" Within a few minutes they did, shouting "Will this be long enough??" "Oh, wow. Tiny ass rope. Okay, we'll see when I run out of rope if it was enough or not, and if it isn't you're going to have to send Miss Jones to save ME." He smiled a bit and I laughed a little. "Now," he started. "I want you to finish this. We're about 90 ft on this wall; noone can pull us up and you can't jump down." "No, 1SGT I can'-" "I have no idea what I Can't meas. You HAVE to do this; I'll be behind you incase something goes down." He looked up and yelled. "Okay, I'm going to cut her rope!" He turned to me. "You just hold onto the safety line, dont worry about the other o-" as he said that the rope hit me. I said a quick "Ow," and went on. So after a good 45 minutes, I finally reach the bottom. The people cheered and applauded me and 1SGT Henderson. I was shaking like crazy, face red filled with tears, and suddenly I fainted. Fell right on my face and lied there.
They took me to the medic and I woke up with an ice pack on my head. I sat up and looked around a little, and 1SGT was sleep with his head on my bed. I tilted my head slightly. "...1SGT?" He woke up alerted, then looked. It's like he looked inside me. He smiled and stood up. "Good, you're awake stud." "What happened?" Double Barrel; I knew what happened. I shook my head. "I mean after the-" "Well, you fainted." He takes these uncomfortable pauses. He sat down and put his hand on my shoulder. "I guess after all that the stress just knocked you out." "I can't believe I held onto that rope for so long..." He laughed some turning my way. "Well, had you let go, or had you lost all your strenght without that adrenaline rush, you proooooobably would have fell to your death." My eyes did O_O really wide. "Adrenaline?" He laughed some. "Yeah. Like that lady who picked up that car to save her baby, remember?" "Ohh yeeeeaaahhh.." "Yep. At the time you were hanging there, all the stress caused your muscles to lock up and use everything it had. So at the time you could have picked up a car too." We both laughed and I looked him over again, then at his hand which was bandaged up. "How's your hand?" Again, he smiled this huge smile. "Well, how's yours?" Face heat. "Mine's is fine.." "Well, so is mine. I just need to go to a chiropractor." I laughed and shook my head. He stood up and cracked his back loud. "Well - ow - I think I'd better be going. But I wa-" I clung to his waist and gave him a long silent hug. This guy had saved my life. Saved my life. He then hugged me back for a little bit, then we let go. "I was scared, as well." He admitted. "It gave me flashbacks of when I was in Iraq, and how I fell off one of the buildings.. Unlike this time, the person didn't care to help me try to stay alive, and I hit my head knocked out. The Iraqies thought I was dead, but I wasn't.." He went on this much and I saw his eyes water. He then looked out the window. "I'm just glad you're okay, Stud. I'm going back to the Repelling site." He turned and smiled. "Take care." \
As he closed the door I cried. And cried. And cried some more. I could have died right then and there at camp. All my muscles afterwards snapped in half. I saw my teacher Major Kroeger walking around and he saw me wearing a sling. He grinned biiiiiig and pointed at me. "Haa haaa." XD
Cornel McDonald came to me and they talked to me and I told them what happened. McDonald, he's this old guy who's in charge of the retired army and inactive army people. He held up the top part of the rope they cut off to save me with and extended it out slightly. "This is the top of the rope 1SGT Henderson used to save you with. Clifford was very brave to be able to slide off a cliff and be alive." He then smiled that old man smile. "And so were you to be able to not scream your head off and shimmy back up or let go." I laughed somewhat. He then turned and put it in a glass box extended, and showed it to me. "You and Clifford will be known throughout this ROTC Camp history for what happened today. This was a first time ever to happen, and your name will never be forgotten." He held up the rope. "...The story of Clifford and Cliffhanger." "HEY!" We all laughed and he gave me a pat on my arm. "If you find a better name tell us, I'm terrible at this. But it's all I could think of. We'd be able to know it was you out of everyone else, however; you're the only cadet here with bright blonde braids in her hair."