Sunday, Mar. 20, 2005 - 4:55 p.m.
Penny for an ex-blind person?
I've entered a new era in my life. After fifteen and a half years of devoted gas permeable contact lens wearing, my eyes have had enough. I can no longer keep them in my eyes and not notice them and therefore not get into a big huffy mood when wearing them. I've thrown in the towel and been wearing my glasses for the past three weeks, which I like enough but make me feel like half a person, like a masked avenger or such, as they cover half my face. Like, there's no point wearing eye make up with them on cos you just wouldn't know it.Yesterday I went to the optician and he said, unless you have very strong feelings, I think it's time to try soft contact lenses. He put them in and I went off for two hours and ... I could see! It was a miracle! I felt very happy: sight is a wonderful thing and, considering I was fearing going blind/being limited to glasses forever, something I will never take for granted.
In this two-hour period, mum and I managed to wreak consumer destruction in the small town of my provenance, which has recently opened 1) a luxury clothes/shoes/bag shop 2) a half-decent 'style' bar. The strong economy has finally made its way up the M1. Um. And my good luck continueth as I tried on a pair of SIZE 10 jeans, which do all sorts of good to my bum and I have invested in. I also got a lovely (H0bbs) French-stylee stripey top of much joy.
The shop lady is lovely but let a couple of backhanded-compliments slip out:
"How are you getting on in there [trying on the jeans]?"
*Struggling to get what I thought were size 12 jeans over my thighs, but what turned out to be size 8* "...uh, OK but I think I'll need a bigger size in these jeans"
"OK I'll get you a 10; I thought you were the same size as me!"
and
*Mum tries to lift up my top to reveal my belly flesh above my jeans*
"DON'T lift that up!"
[shop lady:] "Oh - I've had two kids, I've got all sorts of lines!"
[me, thinking:] "Bitch! I've had no kids and I don't have ANY BELLY LINES thankyouverymuch, just a belly."
But, back to soft contact lenses: how hard are they to get out?? Extremely. Gas permeable, you just have to twitch the corner of your eye with your finger and POP, they're out, job's done. Last night it took me a good fifteen minutes of stroking the front of my eyebefore I could gain any purchase on it. I feared putting them in again this morning lest I would never be able to remove them again.
So, the lesson for this weekend for me is that sight is great; my spirit has been reborn; I am not as fat as I thought I was; I have been rebellious and vocal all my life, as my mum reminded me; it might be time for me to work out how to work with being rebellious rather than trying to quash it. It takes different strokes, doesn't it?