At A Glance Author Elaine Contact Elaine@bme.anon IAM Elaine When A year ago Location Astoria, OR Several months after my first suspension, I wrote this article for my alma mater's biweekly newspaper, the Mars' Hill. With a few additions (my upper word limit for the newspaper article was 700; the minimum for BME is 800), here is the article.
It was an interesting series of events that led to my standing in this small and chilly garage in Astoria, Oregon. I was shaking not from the cold, but rather from nervousness. Nervous? I'd been downright terrified all day, during the six hour drive my boyfriend and I made from my house. Snatches of the Bene Gesserit "Litany Against Fear" tried to come to mind, but I wasn't sure it was helping. I was about to fly for the first time.
I'm serious about flying; my feet didn't touch the ground for about an hour. No, I didn't sprout wings out of my shoulder blades. I had hooks put in them. You might think this is sick and masochistic; I would have thought the same a year ago. Let me explain.
Thirty minutes previously, I was inside the house getting four new piercings. They were done with standard 10 gauge piercing needles, and immediately followed by 8 gauge hooks – the slightly larger hooks prevent bleeding. I relaxed for a while, getting used to the feeling of metal underneath my skin.
Back to shivering on cinder blocks in the garage. The rope zigzagged from the rig to my back. This was the hardest part for me. In fact, at one point my field of vision began to narrow as blackness crept in from the outside. I began to hear things differently, as if I was far away and underwater. I felt sick and dizzy. The person rigging me up came around in front of me to ask if I was okay. Unable to speak, I motioned for him to get out of the way. He did, just in time to miss being vomited on. My head cleared, and my hearing and vision returned. "Do you want to come down?" he asked. "No," I said, "I feel much better now." After some more tugging and adjusting, he took both my hands and began to walk back and forth with me, as if dancing. "When you're ready," he said, "instead of stepping back, pull yourself toward me."
Suddenly everything changed, and at that point I knew I had conquered my fear. I was gasping, wide-eyed, in surprise. The cinder blocks were gone and I was swinging, flying, weightless. It was blissful. I swung for almost an hour, I think - but time was the last thing on my mind. It's odd that the main part of the entire ritual is the part that I have the least to say about. The best way I can describe the feeling is a combination of opposites – freedom, not being limited to the ground anymore; and constraint, being attached to strings like a marionette. In all my pictures I am smiling, and saying to myself, "I'm flying!" I wish it could have lasted longer, but eventually I knew it was time to come down. The cinder blocks were replaced under my feet. Taking my weight off the hooks felt like pushing up against something heavy on my shoulders.
Later, I was the recipient of an excellent back massage. The hooks had pulled on my skin, allowing air to become trapped underneath. Known as "rice krispies," they need to be pushed out. The name comes from the sound it makes. They didn't dissipate completely for a couple days, and until they did, I kept happily pressing my shoulder blades like a child with a sheet of bubble wrap.
I assume that most people are currently asking at least one of two questions, and I'll respond to the easier one first. Didn't that hurt? The answer is yes and no. Inserting the hooks, like any normal piercing, hurt momentarily – if you've had one, you'd know what it feels like. Just imagine four in rapid succession. Rigging me up hurt a little, but for the most part it just felt strange – I'd never felt anything like that before. Later, my back was sore like after a good workout for a few days. However, during the actual suspension, from takeoff to landing, I felt no pain whatsoever.
The other question is a bit more complicated – why? It wasn't about hurting myself, or being fetishistic, or trying to achieve enlightenment (though some people may have those reasons). The short answer is, I was curious. When I first heard of suspension, I felt revolted; it was the most depraved, morally bankrupt act I could think of.
Later on, though, I became friends with people who had suspended, and realized that they weren't some special kind of freak; they were just like anyone else. Everyone had different experiences, but everyone saw it positively and had no regrets. I was still curious what it would be like, and decided there was only one way to find out.
I didn't have a profound spiritual experience. But I was flying for what seemed like hours, and yet, not long enough. I faced my fear. I enjoyed a unique time of closeness with my boyfriend, and he in turn learned more about this aspect of my life. Most importantly, though, I overcame a knee-jerk reaction. I learned not to reject something out of hand for the simple reason that I didn't understand it. And I had a lot of fun doing it.
I admit I expected some negative reactions from a newspaper published by a Christian university. In fact, I was almost more afraid of writing the article than I was about the suspension itself. However, there were none. The editor, a friend of mine, mentioned that she had even received several comments congratulating them for printing the article. Whoda thunk!? I'm glad I could get over my fear once more and introduce a new concept and a new point of view to a couple thousand students, staff, and faculty.