Sometimes opportunity knocks and it rings so loud and so clear in your ears that there’s no escaping it, no denying it. The what ifs, the risks and the costs pop up like variability in untracked backcountry snow, but you chose the line – or it chose you – and you’re gonna ride it out.

I’d caught wind of a SheJumps freeride ski clinic happening at Alpental on Facebook. A few friends had indicated that they were interested and a good friend of mine even encouraged me to go. When I read the description of the clinic, I froze up at, “Advanced and Expert Level Skiers Only.” I am a climber turned skier. I do not see myself as being an advanced or expert level skier. I see myself more in the “go average, go often,” category. I told my friend that I couldn’t go because I didn’t fit the criteria.

He pushed back. And I’m glad he did. That’s when the knocking began to ring in my ears.

I noticed that there was a $60 fee associated with the clinic that didn’t include the lift ticket and certainly didn’t include the gas it would take to drive more than 4 hours to ski for 3 hours. But it didn’t stop the knocking.

The week before the clinic, I had a few work projects to wrap up and the thought of asking my boss for the flexibility to leave early on a work day to go skiing made me nervous. But my nerves didn’t stop the knocking. I bit the bullet, drafted the email, reread it twice and before I could bail, quickly clicked: “Send.”

My boss said it was ok for me to cash in some personal time and go. And that’s when I got genuinely excited.

I was intimidated to show up for a freeride clinic when I had only a vague understanding of what freeride skiing was. But more than that, I was intimidated to show up and be weak. I can ski with the usual guy gang and embrace the fact that I’ve logged the least days on my skis. I can watch them air off of things, throw tricks or ski steep, intimidating terrain and recognize that I’m just not there yet. But I want to be. And that’s exactly why I had to go.

I came into the clinic hot. Not sweaty hot, but talking-too-loud, smiling huge at any girl that looked like she might possibly be attending, vigorously nodding at anything said in my general direction; that kind of hot. I certainly didn’t mellow out once we got onto the snow; oh no, I was full-body, full-on stoked. And for good reason.

Skiing with women is different. Energetically, we vibe on a different level. I’m used to having to stick up for myself with the guys. I’m used to acting tough when I really want to cry. I work hard to conceal my weakness whenever I possibly can. All of those feelings evaporated. I was just there with a bunch of similarly stoked women. Instead of feeling like I had to fight to keep up, I felt like I was part of something.

There was no condescension, no expert halo. There were just women helping women gain the confidence and skills to ski more aggressively, to inspire onlookers from chairlifts, to be better partners to uplift other women. It was awesome.

I’m glad I went not just because I got to dip out of work early to ski on a Tuesday night; not because I made a bunch of new ski partner connections; not even because I finally learned how to get out of the backseat (finally!) I’m stoked because I learned that I can ski with women. I’m stoked because that experience taught me that I love to ski for me – not to just keep up with my boyfriend, not because it’s the cool thing to do in the winter.

Plain and simple: skiing is fun and skiing with girls is funner.