Dear Editor,

Every once in a while you have to stir up your blood - do something crazy so you don't have to pinch yourself to see whether you are really alive or this world is just one big dream.

The other day I decided to do just that, do something I have been wanting to do for 50 years, so I phoned up a skydiving service and made an appointment to cross another wish off my bucket list.

The common wisdom is that it is crazy to jump out of a perfectly good aircraft, but I am here to tell you that is just wrong - it's totally awesome.

I have done a few awesome things in my life, but doing a one-minute freefall is beyond most anything I have experienced.

I can't describe the moment you leave that aircraft and you plummet to the earth at 200 km/h, and then your parachute opens and you glide and soar in an unbelievable six-minute drop to earth that is easily the most intense, exhilarating experience ever.

It is an experience my son and I will never forget. Everything about it was first class, from our jump masters to the unparalleled beauty of our super natural B.C. - when you jump out that airplane door it looks like an awesome abstract painting, until you finally get close enough to earth that the water becomes water, green becomes trees, and the little specks become people.

It truly is indescribable and should be on every person's bucket list, if for no other reason than to see the incredible beauty that we are lucky enough to call home.

Unfortunately, my perfect day turned out to have a political side also.

The skydiving, a wellrun company that has been providing excellent service to the people of Pitt Meadows and Greater Vancouver for decades, is being shut down by the airport authority. Not only will people lose good jobs, but many support workers that work with and supply the company will also be put in jeopardy, not to mention putting a hole in the Pitt Meadows commercial tax base.

This is the kind of thoughtless action that angers me. Governments are willing to bend for the big corporations, but here a successful, small, but labour-intensive company is just shut down over a couple acres of grass and a proposed runway expansion.

It seems to me to be an issue that should be of concern not only to the Pitt Meadows council but the taxpayers as well.

Doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

Wayne Clark, Maple Ridge