I’ve been thinking a lot about my nearsightedness lately.
I can’t actually remember a time when I could see distances. I wonder if that played into how I ended up being bullied in grade school. Perhaps the other kids were friendly to me and I couldn’t see them, and so I looked unfriendly?
The biggest drawback to this theory is that if that’s what happened, why didn’t it come out during the times when the teachers tried to reason with the bullies and get them to stop?
I mean, “she’s unfriendly to me” would seem to be a decent defense to accusations of bullying, after all.
I can definitely remember times when I couldn’t see what was going on around me. My personal favorite was when I went to my uncle’s wedding and thought that the candles were blinking lights, like on the control panel of the Enterprise in Star Trek.
I also tried to cross against the light when I was little. I mean, I knew not to cross when traffic was coming, but my teacher had told us only to cross when “the light” was green. And the only light I could see, the one perpendicular to me was green, so I went, even though the traffic going parallel to us wasn’t stopped. I’d been trained not to break the rules, no matter how stupid they seemed to me.
When we discovered that I needed glasses, we were at the circus, which was held, I believe, at the International Amphitheatre. We were waiting for it to start, and I asked my folks what time it was. “Can’t you see the clock?” they asked in surprise.
When I said I couldn’t, they said it was there, on the wall. I looked way down at one end of the arena, then way down at the other, and looked at my parents, mystified. My mom had brought a pair of opera glasses with her, and she held them in front of my face. “Stop me when you can see the clock.”
She began to adjust the dial. Slowly the clock came into focus. It was right across from where we were sitting.
My parents later told me that they already knew that I was nearsighted because they’d gotten the results from the school vision screenings, but I don’t believe that’s how it happened at all. I don’t think they’d’ve gotten nearly that quiet if it was something they were expecting.
So I went to the eye doctor, who sold his practice to another eye doctor, who was my doctor until I got married in 1991.
Speaking of which, I’m overdue for an eye checkup. I need to get on that soon.
Our Gratuitous Amazon Link for today is Ghoulfriends Just Want to Have Fun, by Gitty Daneshvari. We’re continuing the tale of Robecca, Venus, and Rochelle’s first year at Monster High and we see more of the major characters from the Monster High toy series.