I woke up yesterday morning dreaming about my skis I bought when I was a freshman in college. They were the pair of skis in the photos above. They were my identity, is what I dreamed. My bright orange Olin Mark IVs.

I bought them in Everett, Wash. near my hometown of Snohomish. I was a student at the University of Washington in Seattle. The sales guy who sold me the skis was cute and he asked me to go skiing with him.

I remember the day so well. It was raining on the mountain and the snow was thick slush and totally unskiable (if that’a word?)

We had lunch in the ski lodge and headed down the mountain in the sales guy’s sports car, a small Fiat, which broke down on the way home. Those were the days before cell phones, but somehow we got back to Everett and my car. Once we got to the sales guy’s apartment, a friend and coworker from the ski shop came over with a case of beer. Apparently it was payment of a bet on if I’d go skiing with him.

I loved skiing. I enjoyed it so much, that I went to Sun Valley with a girlfriend on Spring break to ski. We decided then and there that we’d take off our sophomore year to become ski bums. We got jobs and an apartment lined up on our Sun Valley ski vacation for the next ski season.

My parents weren’t sold on me taking off a year of school. They were sure it would get me off track and they feared I wouldn’t go back to school.

As luck would have it, I didn’t make it to the next ski season because I ran across a street and froze like a deer in the headlights and got hit by a pick up truck. My girlfriend went ahead with the Sun Valley season — and no she didn’t make it back to the UW.

It reminds me of the saying to get out over your skis.

What moment have you had when your plans dramatically changed from what you had planned?