Stories to Tell Ep 1 Guest Susan Ryerson - What It’s Like to Parachute Jump Out of an Airplane, Being 2 Hours Late to our First Date and Embarrassing Moments in the Army National Guard

In this episode of the Stories To Tell Podcast, the host's wife, Susan Ryerson, shares some of her interesting stories. The first story is about the time Susan decided to parachute jump out of an airplane. She describes the excitement and fear she felt during the experience and how she committed to the training of working with a parachute. She explains the process of climbing out onto the wing and letting go, and how it was the most exciting day of her life. Susan also shares a funny incident during her time in the Army National Guard when she fell while running towards a helicopter. She also recalls an embarrassing moment during rifle training when she misunderstood an instruction and threw her weapon forward. The host also mentions how he was two and a half hours late for their first date when they met in Columbus, OH, which Susan found memorable rather than embarrassing. Overall, the episode features entertaining and humorous stories from Susan's life.

Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):

Welcome to the Stories To Tell Podcast. And in this episode, I have a very special guest. Not only is she my best friend in the world, but also my amazing wife, Susan Markin. Susan has some great stories to tell in this episode, including some funny incidents while she was in the National Guard. How she responded when I was more than two hours late. That's right. Two hours late to our first date and a bunch more. But our first story will be about the time Susan decided to jump out of an airplane.
(00:44)
That was the best day of my entire life. Why? I'm serious. I don't know if I could ever top that. Speaker 1 (00:51):

What was it about the experience? TheSpeaker 2 (00:52):

Whole thing from the training, the excitement, the scared, the doing it scared. Anyway, doing it with my oldest brother, just the two of us going through it together. I was really scared in the beginning. He pretended he wasn't toward the end, you could tell he was getting more scared and I was getting more excited. And just the whole thing of climbing out on that wing all by yourself, I mean, it's like you are the only one that can stop you at this point. So I committed to this training, I'm going for it. And I was terrified, but I was also probably more excited than I ever have been.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
Now were you sitting, I saw a video of the plane and it was one of these, it's a pretty small plane, and there's like what, three or four other jumpers in there, you and your brother? A couple others.

Just Speaker 2 (01:51):
There were three of us.

Speaker 1 (01:52): And then you were positioned by the door, weren't you? Yes. And then so you're flying up there, you're getting about a thousand foot or

Speaker 2 (01:59):
We jumped from 3000 feet.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
Dang. 3000 feet. And so when they fling that door open and you're just like, Susan, you're up. I mean, did your heart just go, oh yeah. Or your stomach or whatever they say.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
Yeah. When that door flew open, I just remember thinking, oh shit. And you could see the look on my face was like, it went from really excited to crap up. Yeah. And so when you fling your legs out, the wind is moving your legs, and so you have to still your body.

Speaker 1 (02:37):

So that was the first step. You sort of scooted yourself forward a little bit and put your legs out in the window.

Where were your hands? Were they holding onto something?

Speaker 2 (02:47):

I was hanging onto the door handle first, but then you have to let go because then you have to stand on the wing and then reach up for the crossbars, the that's above the wing. And then when your hands are on the bar and holding on, then you just let your feet go and you're hanging, flying.

Speaker 1 (03:11):

Like a Superman's pose or something like that. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2 (03:14):

Then you're looking at the pilot and he gives you the thumbs up and you just let go. Wow. And that was, like I said, it was probably the most exciting day in my entire life. Wow. 58 years. And I don't know if I'd do it again.

Speaker 1 (03:32):

Was it just like one of those one and dones? I accomplished it?

Speaker 2 (03:37):

Yeah, I think so, because everything went so well. I mean, it was like textbook. I mean, I had a blast. My mom could hear me and having laughing in the air. And How long did you I did the drop and roll when I got just textbook, everything. Oh, wow. So everything was perfect. I didn't get hurt, nothing. And so I'm just kind of like, would I want to test that myself or fade again, break my kneecaps or something? Probably not.

Speaker 1 (04:07):

Oh, that's a cool story. I, I think most people, right. What do you think? Percentage of people's got to be pretty low that's willing to jump out of an airplane.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
I mean, some people don't think it's a very smart thing to do. Obviously. What was the funny thing about that story though is we went through six hours of training, And then we all walked out of the training class. And this is after we'd seen film after film of lines twisted, people crashing, all this crazy stuff. So we walk out and the very first jumper we see doesn't do the last step. She didn't, it's called flare. So you put both your hands down and it makes your parachute kind of round and it almost stops you midair

Speaker 1 (04:59):

Right before you hit the ground

Speaker 2 (05:00):

Kind of. And then you just float the last 10 feet. And so before you're doing that though, you're going like 30 miles an hour and wind while you're flying. And so she froze mid, just froze and hit the ground and just got drug 30 or 40 feet down the field. And we were like, oh my gosh, the ambulances are going and we're all, oh my gosh. We're all like, oh my gosh, you

Speaker 1 (05:26):

Like out no time out.

Speaker 2 (05:28):

We're like, oh my gosh. I felt like I was going to puke. So my brother and I and a few other people that were with us, we started standing on the chairs and going flare and just practicing. When we're in the air and they tell you to flare, your automatic response is going to be to pull your hands down and pull those ropes because we're like, I don't want that to happen. I think that's what scared me into just doing a textbook. Everything I learned was in my head and I did it. Perfect.

Speaker 1 (06:03):

Did you see anybody else on the field just say, yeah, I'm out of here. Went to their car, dropped their shute off. Didn't even stop back in the building. They were just right to the parking lot. See you later.

Speaker 2 (06:12):

Don't think so. I think we all went for it, but we were all very pretty serious at that point.

Speaker 1 (06:19):

So your brother is in the back of the airplane, right? He's more in the tail kind of, and then he watches you get out onto the wing, and then did he tell you anything about what he saw when you got out there or anything?

Speaker 2 (06:35):

It wasn't what he saw, but it was what he heard. And so when you do a solo jump like that, you have a tagline that's hooked to the plane and the tagline pulls your shoot open for you. And so as soon as you let go and within seconds that tagline opened your chute, and then the line is attached to the plane. Well, he heard this big slam of the rope or the line hitting the plane. He thought it was me. Oh my gosh. Trying to, he's like, oh my gosh, is she okay? Is she okay?

Speaker 1 (07:10):

Oh my gosh. From somebody crashing and then hearing a bang against a plane as soon as you let go. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2 (07:17):

It took me a good two days to calm down from that, doing that. I was so wired and adrenaline rushed. It was just crazy.

Speaker 1 (07:28):

I remember seeing it, and I think adrenaline rush is the right thing. You brought a video home and it turned on when were, I think when the plane was getting near to where they opened the door and you had sort of like a jumpers one Z on or whatever you call 'em. Sure. You don't call 'em onesie. And then you had a helmet, right? You have a helmet on. And then I saw your face. And honestly, it didn't even look like you. It's like your eyes are so big and you're just like your face and everything. I'm really into this. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. That's a good story right there. I think a lot of people want to wonder what that's really like. So you've related that pretty good. And it's pretty funny that you would do it again. I think it's one of those amazing things. Why do you need to do it again? I did it. Right. Exactly. Yeah. You get on a conference call and people are like, so tell us something interesting you've done in your life. You got it knocked out for the rest of your life. Nobody else is going to be able to top that. 
(08:33)

You remember the excitement of first dates? Oh, it's so exciting. And nerve wracking too. You're probably getting maybe a new haircut, maybe some new clothes, getting a car washed, double and triple checking the reservations that you made just because you want it to be perfect. I don't think anywhere does it say, what's a good idea? Be two hours late to your first date. You ended up in the insurance business. And so I did too. And so that's kind of how we originally got connected, how we kind of met each other. It was funny, I was going through some prep for this, and you look at different questions you can ask and stuff like that. And one of the ones that is a common question is, what is your most embarrassing moment in your life? And so I was thinking about that a little bit. Do you know what one of mine might be? Speaker 2 (09:29):

No. Speaker 1 (09:31):

Well, it has to do when we met in Columbus, because on our first date I showed up two and a half hours late. Speaker 2 (09:39):

That I don't know if that's an embarrassing as much, as much as just being memorable. Oh, memorable. It was fate. Speaker 1 (09:52):

Yeah. Speaker 2 (09:53):

I feel like it was fate because I knew you were it for me. I knew it. And I wasn't leaving until you got there. And I didn't care if I waited there forever. I knew. I just trusted that something must have come up and you were going to get there sooner or later. And all my friends were like, you shouldn't wait for him and blah, blah. And I'm like, yeah, I'm going to see you later. Speaker 1 (10:22):

And it really was about two and a half hours. It was, yeah. So we were going to meet at right off High Street there at a popular bar that we would go to North Tavern. Oh, that's right. Short North Tavern. I forgotten the name. And I was going to evening school at the time, and it was just one of those things where I just got stuck. And to show our age, it was pre-cell phone. Exactly. There was no texting, there was no nothing like that. So when I would get these breaks, I would run down, I think it was a four story bill, and I had to run down to the bottom floor, try to make a payphone call, and it was a pretty popular place. And I'd be like, oh, I'm looking for this young lady. And I think some people in there kind of knew you and you could just hear all the noise in the background.
(11:03)
It was a packed place. And they were like, yeah, we're not going to go find her and tell her you're going to be on your way. I did that I think three times. Oh, wow. So two and a half hours. And I'm just like, oh man. So I went for it too. I'm thinking, well, maybe she's still there. And I drove there. I remember just kind of booking it down high Street and short North had those glass windows right up front. That's where I was. And I went right in there. You were. And we just saw you just locked eyes. Right, man, you were all smiling and stuff. Yeah. Speaker 2 (11:33):

Yeah. I knew you'd Speaker 1 (11:34):

Come 30 years later, man. Speaker 2 (11:37):

Yep. Speaker 1 (11:39):

Life's most embarrassing moments. Everybody's had 'em, man. They are uncomfortable. But what if your life's embarrassing moments were while you served in the National Guard? Speaker 2 (11:53):

Well, I have a really funny, embarrassing moment when I was in the service. There you Speaker 1 (11:57):

Go. Speaker 2 (11:58):

So we all got to do a helicopter ride, and I was a platoon leader, and so I led the pack. And so when we were waiting on the helicopter, our sergeant was saying, okay, now when you run up to it, you have to kind of squat, run, keep your head down or whatever, Speaker 1 (12:23):

Sort of crouch Speaker 2 (12:23):

Or whatever. And so I was like, all right, I got this. Come on. Okay, ready? Move out. And we all take off running. Well, I wiped out and three or four people fell over top of me, and that Speaker 1 (12:36):

Was really funny. Oh man. Who was sort of, oh, Speaker 2 (12:41):

We were dying. My sergeant just shook his head at me because he knew I was a clutz. Speaker 1 (12:46):

Yeah. Did you have other experiences with him too, where he was probably like, oh, that's just Susan or Speaker 2 (12:50):

Whatever. So before that happened, this is probably the funniest story, if I can You want me to tell it? Heck Speaker 1 (12:57):

Yeah. Speaker 2 (12:58):

So I grew up shooting guns, right? Since I could hold a gun, six seven is probably my first clay target I shot. And so when it came to the rifle training, I wasn't intimidated or anything. Heck no. Speaker 1 (13:13):

Yeah. Speaker 2 (13:13):

But my sergeant was intimidating, so I was very nervous and wanting to impress him, like I'm a kill this target. And it was New Jersey in December, snow. It was freezing. And so the sergeant, the guy on the speaker said, now just do everything I say exactly as I say it and we'll get out of here. Speaker 1 (13:43):

You're like on a rifle range type? Yes. Speaker 2 (13:45):

We're all lined up in big, long line, Speaker 1 (13:47):

Big, long line people. Speaker 2 (13:47):

Okay. And my sergeants walk in the line right back Speaker 1 (13:50):

And forth. Okay, sure, sure. Speaker 2 (13:52):

And so the guy on the speaker says, okay, everybody on your knees. So we all get on our knees and I have my weapon in my hands. You're ready for it. And he says, thrust your weapon forward. So I just pitched mine and I look around and everybody's down. So I dove down, and of course my sergeant saw that. Speaker 1 (14:13):

Oh, had to be. So Speaker 2 (14:15):

That was pretty funny. Everybody. And in my book that we get at the end of basic, I don't know how many people wrote Thrust Your Weapon Forward. I was just concentrating so much on doing exactly what he said. Oh, wow. So I thrust your weapon forward. So I just pitched it, threw it ahead of me. I thought we were going to dive on it, so I didn't know Speaker 1 (14:37):

You were just following our here I was. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Speaker 2 (14:42):

So between those two, that's probably the most embarrassing, but I have many of them, so it'd be hard to pick. Just one. Speaker 1 (14:50):

Thank you to Susan for coming on the show this week, and thank you for listening. Be sure to follow stories to Tell, as there will be many more episodes coming soon. All the best.