The Blue Hole : a memoir

The e-book format of my memoir The Blue Hole will be .99 cents on March 8, and $1.99 on March 9.

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www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?docId=1000493771


"...That bullet lodged in my arm should have been a reminder of what happens when you do risky things, but all I cared about was that it proved I was the neighborhood’s toughest guy. So two years later, when Fred, Sammy, Walt, and I took off running down the street towards the Farrel’s backyard for a swim in their pool, thoughts of how dangerous risk-taking could be were long forgotten.
      Walt’s parents had put in one of those aboveground pools and our loud pack descended on his house on most hot days. When we reached the pool, I ran up the stairs and stepped onto the wooden deck. Hey, would you look at that; someone had nailed a makeshift diving board on top of a broken tree next to the pool. The top of the tall snag with its attached board was about six or seven feet above the pool’s rim. What a great idea, even if it wasn’t as impressively high as the cliffs on the White River. I climbed up like a monkey to the wobbly old plank at the top of the snag and curled my toes around the edge of it. My buddies watched as I concentrated on another perfect dive. They spurred me on just like the hippies around the river’s swimming hole had done¬—Dive, Dan. You can do it. I squished my toes tight against the end of the plank. I straightened my back and legs and raised my arms above my head as someone pushed a black inner tube into the center of the pool for a diving target. Dive, Dan. You can do it.
     You’d bet I can. I, Dan Gilman, am invincible.
     My feet left the board. I sprung upwards and curved into a flawlessly executed dive. I imagined I was one of those cliff divers they show on The Wide World of Sports as I plunged headfirst. In that split second everything was light and sparkling and summer was perfect and I was the center of attention.
Until my head snapped down and slammed into my chest.
      The world turned blue and soft and silent.
      I floated in the clouds.
Later the doctor would say I’d fractured my spinal column at cervical level 4. The fourth vertebrae of my neck slipped out and moved behind the fifth. The disc separating the fourth and fifth vertebrae was crushed. The paralysis was instantaneous..."

---excerpt from The Blue Hole

The Blue Hole