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Friday, July 30, 2004

Just Jump

As Bingo would say, this is the post in which I confess my depravity.

Up to this point, you may have the impression that I’m a pretty nice guy, maybe a little sappy and sentimental, but nice. That worries me. It means you aren’t seeing the real me. So, to rectify that issue, I’m going to come clean and show you truly how sick I am.

About a month ago, my roommates Dennis, Dave and I were going on a little family bike ride that took us to the Stone Arch Bridge in downtown Minneapolis. It’s one of my favorite bridges, especially because there are no cars allowed on the bridge. It leisurely crosses the Mississippi with a curve, its stone legs and arches graceful yet gritty – a personification of this city, I think. Just to the north are the only remaining falls on the Mississippi, and when the rain has been steady (like it was then), the water below roars and rushes and foams.

It’s virtually impossible to cross a bridge and not become mesmerized by the flow below, so we stopped in the middle to watch the water, the falls cooling our faces. As we talked about how we wanted to get a dog, we simultaneously became aware of a Native American, obviously homeless, completely drunk, dirty man about 15 yards to our right. For a few minutes, he just stood there at the bridge railing, talking to himself and making odd hand gestures.

Then, though, he looked over at us, grabbed the metal railing with both hands, and climbed over. He planted his heels on the narrow strip of bridge between the railing and the open air and stared down at the water.

Dennis, Dave and I looked at each other. All eyebrows raised.

“Is he going to jump?”

“Should we do something?”

“What would we do?”

A nervous-looking man was also near this scene, taking his toddler son for a walk. He herded his son away from the drunken Indian, and looked at us with a questioning look. We stared back with blank faces. Apparently, no one was going to do anything except watch.

Then, the dude on the edge went a step further. Hands still on the railing, he turned his back toward the water and dropped his feet from the edge. Now, he was literally hanging from the railing.

At this point, I thought, “I wonder what he’s listening to in his big, studio-size headphones? Is it something peaceful and acoustic or something hard and electric?”

As he was hanging there, the drunk man looked at us – my roommates and I. It was a deliberate look. He was testing us to see if we would do anything or say anything to stop him, or convince him that life really is worth living.

And here’s where you realize that I’m sick.

When he looked at us, it was all I could do to not look back, shrug my shoulders carelessly and say, “Do it.”

It’s true, I really wanted him to do it. There was some adrenaline in my system, but not because I wanted him to come back to safety. It was there because I wanted to see him let go of the railing and let gravity pull him into the falls. I was curious if he would hit the water and bob back up, or if would he just disappear. Would he scream on the way down? I wanted to know.

I didn’t do it, though. When he looked at us, we just stared back silently. The nervous man with the kid was still staring at us, too, waiting for us to do something.

After a minute or so of hanging there, I guess the drunk man’s fingers got tired and his eyes were strained from staring at us. (It’s difficult to stare when you’re drunk.) He pulled himself back up and climbed over the railing to safety.

I was disappointed.

But once back on the bridge, the drunk man looked at the water, pointed his index finger down at the falls and made a barbaric yell, like he had just conquered the water, beat it into submission. He thrust his finger downward like he was putting it in its place.

Dennis, Dave and I bust out laughing. Hardcore. The drunk man looked at us and said something unintelligible, but probably along the lines of, “You fuckers.”

We hopped on our bikes and took off toward home. We laughed for miles.

Now you know that I’m a bad person.

Posted by Aaron on July 30, 2004 9:53 AM