For reasons too tragic to disclose (I'm learning to be responsible and senior at my once-a-week lolly shop job) I was up at five today. I'm not really a morning person, as evidenced by the fact that once, still drunk with sleep, I took a swing at a friend and made her lip bleed. Wonderful, wonderful me.
But I pulled myself out of bed at the prospect of those three sweet minimum wage hours (remember from the last post how desperate I am?) and off I went. In a way, it was nice; there was a sense of community in the mutual hatred of that ungodly hour. It was mostly weary tradies (do other countries use that word?) and shocked-looking businesspeople... and me, poor little lolly girl. You might feel like I'm getting a bit off-topic in a moment, but stay with me. One thing was different on this trip, and it wasn't the number of folks fumbling with broadsheets. I had new contact lenses.
For the right sighted, contacts and glasses and complicated surgery all seem like such a hassle. Let me level with you: for a vast majority of the time, they are. Apart from the cred you earn from having prescription glass in those frames and being able to terrify eight year-olds by sticking fingers in your eye, it's not much joy. But when you have your script updated; that's when I pity the optically sound.
How can I describe what it's like to relive the novelty of first sight? Over time, as your eyes wither, you don't notice that details fade. But when your -2.75 script jumps to a -3.50, you abruptly realise that you've been missing out. Everything is suddenly clear-cut and beautiful. The first thing I do is look at leaves; what grows to be a blurred green mess becomes thousands of individual shapes, all crisply edged with individual shadows. Then everything comes in a rush: power lines and eaves on houses and the deliberate lines of a skyscraper. The morning helped: I managed, through dumb luck, to time my departure so that my ten-minute walk fell in that golden half hour, when everything is dripping with light and you feel like the air is thick with it. (Naturally, I was too busy gawping at No Parking signs to take any proper pictures; just these blurry hot air balloons from the train.)
I've been really wanting to get contact lenses too for the same reason but I went into a store a few times for a trial and could not get the damn things into my eyes as much as I tried :(
ReplyDeleteOoh, I know! It took me ages to get them to work. In the end, I blackmailed myself by buying them; I couldn't bear wasting all that money, haha!
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