One icy winter day a few years ago, I went cross-country skiing in northern New Hampshire with a gang of friends. We started late, we were tremendously out of shape, we underestimated the length and difficulty of the trail, and we were carrying far too much in our packs (it was mostly alcohol, and damned if we were going to throw that out). We were, in other words, a disaster in the making.

When the dark moonless night fell six hours later, we were about two miles from the end of the trek, exhausted, drunk, laughing, and breaking trail through three feet of new-fallen snow. We were having a blast. But then it began to dawn on us that we might end up as seven National Park Service statistics. Turning around wasn't an option, and we could no longer see even our skis in front of us. Our instincts told us the trail was dipping downhill, but we had no idea what lay ahead. We couldn't take off our skis and walk -- the snow was just too deep.

Finally, after much deliberation, we realized that someone was going to have to ski down the incline and find out what lay ahead -- because, lovely as the woods were, we weren't about to spend the night in them. The plan was foolhardy and ill-advised, so naturally I volunteered. How often do you get to throw yourself into the complete unknown?

I remember vividly the way I felt as I pushed off, away from the safety of standing still, into the black. I was absolutely terrified until my skis began to slide. Then the fear just drained away. Committing to the unknown was oddly calming.

I was reminded of that experience a few weeks ago, on a rainy Saturday night, when my boyfriend proposed to me. I said yes (a number of times, in rapid succession), and as I did, I could feel that snow under my skis again.

I have spent the past 38 years as a single person, happy in my own little clearing in the woods. Being single hasn't always been a laugh riot. I've alternately lusted for and fled from members of the opposite sex, but I've never met one with whom I wanted to team up permanently. I can't say I'm commitment-phobic, but I was in absolutely no hurry to pair off. My ambivalence about having children contributed to my laissez-faire attitude. Plus, I loved being able to do what I wanted, when and with whom I wished.

Then I met my fiancé, and the safety and fun of my little world suddenly didn't seem half as interesting as the potential future we could make together. So, when he asked, I said yes.

But the journey from my safe little world to this mysterious, darkened, snow-covered hill known as marriage is 10 times more terrifying than any ill-conceived ski trip could ever be. I'm not scared of being married to my honey, which I'm sure will be worth all the hard work I'm willing to put into it. What I'm scared of is me.

Who am I if I'm not that wild, single woman, making her way in the woods? They say you shouldn't get married until you know who you are. I know exactly who I am . . . as a single woman. But who the hell am I going to be as a wife? No one tells you about this part of getting engaged. You don't get an instruction manual. You can watch your own mother, your married friends, but frankly, doing so is a big reason I've avoided marriage in the first place. I've seen my previously single, fun friends morph into "wives" -- their unique identities swallowed up by family structure, laundry, feeding people who don't say thank you. I watched women quit exciting careers they spent their whole lives developing to have kids; to run homes and create carpools; to fight about money and whose turn it is to clean up; to never, ever go out; and, most horrifyingly, to watch their sexual selves gradually dissipate.

This is the fate I've avoided so carefully, and with which I've consoled myself when being single felt too burdensome. "At least," I would say as I cracked open a Friday-night pint of Ben & Jerry's, "at least I'm not that." Yet now I am willingly entering this machine that seems capable of spitting out only one product: "wives." At times, just saying the word has had the power to make me queasy. "You better hurry up and write your book," my sister said to me, on the day we announced our engagement. "Once you're married, you won't have anything wild to write about any more."

But standing still is no longer an option; it's time to come out of the woods. The path is dark, but it is a path I can't ignore -- it's just too compelling. I'll have my best friend by my side, and we'll help each other find out who we are as husband and wife. I hope we'll also learn how to stay who we are now.

But maybe this is how it starts for everyone. You vow you'll be different. You swear you won't morph into a "wife." The next thing you know, you're obsessing about window treatments and preschools and lawnmower brands. Maybe it's all inevitable.

Or maybe I will find a new way down that darkened slope. My skis are sharp, my legs are strong, and once I push off, experience has taught me that this fear I feel now will lift. Committing to the unknown, as I learned years ago, can be oddly calming.

Kris Frieswick can be reached at k.frieswick@verizon.net.

Issue Date: September 27 - October 3, 2002