I hadn’t spared as much as a moment’s consideration to the idea of fearing them; at least not any that I remembered. But, of course, that was all before the night when a deranged serial killer had tossed me over the side of the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge somewhere near the middle of its span across the Mississippi river. Now to that, I had given more than just a passing thought. I had dwelled on it. And, to say the least, it was definitely something I wasn’t going to forget. Not in this lifetime and probably not even the next.

Fortunately for me, the rope he had been trying to hang me with had held fast. The other bonus was that it had been wrapped around my arm instead of my neck. It was only due to this stroke of blind luck that I had the luxury of being able to recall that night in all of its Technicolor detail.

But that’s another story, sort of.

Now, to clarify, I have to point out that I’m not one to panic or go into an immobile stupor due to a fear of heights- not at all. Whenever confronted by the vertical demon, I simply feel an involuntary catch in my throat and then experience that sinking flutter in the pit of my stomach that always precedes the ‘fight or flight’ adrenalin dump of fear. Of course, it is just about then that said adrenalin does exactly that- dump.

With a sudden flood into my circulatory system, the hormone embarks on an emotionally driven attempt to rescue me from the perceived danger. A few seconds later I, mutter some form of exclamation, the cleanliness of which is directly proportional to the height multiplied by the amount of adrenalin then divided by my heart rate. That accomplished, I remove myself from the situation.

For the most part, all it ever really does is make me tense muscles I don’t even remember having and then battle a lingering headache for an hour or two.

“Sudden stop.” My friend’s deep voice uttered the two simple words from behind and above my left shoulder.