I Can See Clearly Now

Folks, my eyes are rubbish.

I come from a long line of people with rubbish eyes.

We were all glasses wearers in my family. 

In the 1980's we looked like a family of hoot owls. 

I have been wearing glasses for nearly 30 years now. 

 In 1987, I just started wearing them occasionally for reading. I mean, I didn't need them all the time. In fact, I could go without them several hours of the day. I was fine. I could handle it. 

I went on like that for several years until one weekend in 1993 when I had a killer migraine. I thought I was dying. When I finally could stand to be in the light again, I put on my reading glasses and it was like I had forgotten how to read. The page was full of unintelligible black squiggles. But when I took off my glasses, I could see it clearly.  I raced to my optometrist and he tested my eyes. I will never forget what he said.

I don't know how this is even possible, but you have somehow gone from being far-sighted to being near-sighted. 

Seriously, Now I didn't need  reading glasses. I needed distance vision glasses. I was moving onto the hard stuff. Like an addict, I couldn't live without them. My life was a fuzzy outline until I put on the lenses that made everything clear again. I lived for it. I was addicted to being able to see clearly and I wore my glasses from the moment I woke up to the moment I went to sleep. But I thought I was still in control. 

In the year 2000 (or thereabouts) I had another killer headache and upon recovery my glasses were broken. One lens worked and one did not. I again when to my optometrist who was baffled at my vision. he said:

This is not even physically possible. Since the last time I saw you one of your eyes has reverted back to being far-sighted.

So yeah. Now I was near sighted in one eye and far sighted in the other, just like my dear old dad. My eyes were making me an addict. I would do anything--I mean anything--to see clearly. Clarity was my goal. 

Then when I turned 40, my body began to fall apart. 

First my womb decided to stage a revolt and had to be assassinated in what we now call the horrible hysterectomy. Then my eyes decided I needed to be like a crackhead looking for a fix. I needed to see clearly and I needed to see clearly now or somebody might get hurt! 

There was no killer headache this time, just the slow fading of my youth as I sat in the optometrist's chair and was told I needed varifocals. 

 Varifocals, people! That's bifocals without the line! That's for middle aged people! Oh wait--I *am* middle aged! Shudders uncontrollably.

Well that was nearly seven years ago.

I really am middle aged now.

And my eyes are even more rubbish than they were.

It started about a month ago.

The headaches.

Suddenly, all the print was TOO SMALL. Who was going around changing the font size in my library books at night when I was sleeping? Because it was real. I couldn't bloomin' read clearly again.

So off I trotted to Specsavers. I had to wait two weeks for an appointment. Two weeks, people! In the meantime, the world seemed fuzzy and hard to look at. My eyes were dry and sore and the evil print fairy was making every font smaller and smaller as my eyes wept and begged for mercy.

I had my appointment and was told that my eyes had declined, but that was natural for someone of my age. Someone of my age! How dare they! Now, it was clear I was going to be a vision addict for life, but I didn't care. I *really* wanted to see again.

So, my new spectacles would be ready in in two weeks. Another two weeks, people! I found it so hard to wait. Everything was crap. My eyes hurt. My head hurt. My heart hurt knowing I was always going to need visual help. I think I secretly hoped I would grow out of it. But I never was one of those people who didn't wear their specs for "vanity" reasons. No, I needed to be able to see.

Well, today is the day. the day my new spectacles arrived and let me just say, any negative thing i said was WRONG.

It is flippin' GLORIOUS to be able to see again.


It is like riding a unicorn while glitter explodes in my heart.

Everything is so beautiful. Seriously, beautiful. Everything sharply outlined. I have deeply missed sharp outlines.

I danced around town like a character in a musical who was singing an upbeat, heartfelt little number, oblivious to passersby.

I wandered around the public library picking up books with teeny tiny fonts and reading with ease, sighing prettily while little birds flew about my head with daisies in their beaks.

OK, maybe I made up that bit about the birds, but it felt like that.

I felt stoned with happiness. Like I was mellowed out and filled with joy. I really am addicted to seeing clearly and this was BLISS. I hadn't realised how much my eyes had changed. I knew I couldn't seem to read, but had no idea that my distance vision had declined too. I did not know what I was missing until I could see it again.

As Joni Mitchell might or might not have said:
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
'Til it's gone
Get your eyes checked and see the world so clear.

I honestly don't care if I am a speccy-four eyes for the rest of my life. It is wonderful to see this beautiful world with fresh eyes. I will not take my eyes for granted. I will bless them every day for all they do for me.

I can see clearly now.