Seeing is believing and vice versa

Day 262

I still can't see (I am on my sixth different contact lens trial), but I can't see quite a bit better than I couldn't see before, if you see what I mean.

Can't see the keys of the computer but can see the screen, which is a definite improvement. Can see to drive, but can also see how blotchy my legs are now that summer skirts are de riguer. You win some, you lose some.

When I was regularly doing visualisation exercises a few months back, I always pictured myself running up a mountain, with pain-free feet, and lots of energy - not purple in the face, bent double, gasping for breath and requiring air-lifting back down again, which would be the reality of running more than ten yards DOWNHILL now. I also always saw myself bare faced - ie: no glasses, which I've needed since I was 12 and need even more now I am at bifocal stage.

I have great faitnh in the propensity of visualisations to produce results. Ergo, despite the fact that every year or so I try out a pair of lovely, soft, wafer thin contacts which my eyes reject completely, I suddenly find I can wear them in moderate comfort. This is revelatory. Lens are now half the width of a cobweb, it would seem.

This pair have the best vision so far, but have earned themselves the nicknames itchy and scratchy. But I am determined. I have a vision about my vision, so to speak. In My New Life I feel the need to present my face to the world. Open. Undefended. Unhidden. Naked, even. It seems important to do so, therefore I persevere. Glasses can seem like armour, after all.

There are ups and downs, of course. Now I am trying out lenses I frequently poke myself in the eye in an attempt to push non-existent glasses further up my face. Wonder if I can see to put on make-up? What kind of make-up should I wear now that it can be seen?

I had a friend who always put her make-up on in the dark because she said that if she was going to be wearing it out at night, it needed to be strong enough to count. If she could see it in the dark then it was the right amount. I can't begin to tell you how wrong she was, or how scary her blusher looked (which always ended up vertical, for some reason) whenever we went into a pub. I always attracted dirty looks, as if I had been vigorously slapping her about the face and giving her black eyes before we came in.

I worry that this is how I will apply make-up now that I see with very different vision. 20/20 is not all it's cracked up to be. Being short sighted I have always been able to do things that required detail and precision because I could focus perfectly TWO INCHES FROM MY NOSE! Make-up was always put on without glasses, of course, and therefore, I got very close to the mirror. My blending was perfect. Only thing was, I never really knew what it looked like from a distance. And it was usually hidden behind glasses anyway, so I couldn't really tell. What if I am to make-up what Jackson Pollock was to paint ?

I once went to dinner at friends house, and - because I was feeling vain and with a chap I wanted to impress - I left my specs at home. Normally, not a terrible move but this time, disastrous. The table was lit with only one candle and even the perfectly sighted were struggling to see. Also, my mate served a whole salmon, and I spent a lot of time storing the bones in my cheeks for later removal in the loo, c'os I couldn't see to fillet the damn thing at all. I'm lucky to be alive.

But there are things I look forward to. When it rains I will finally be able to feel it on my face rather than that disturbingly violent splash one gets, when a raindrops ricochets off the inside of ones glasses straight into the eye. And I will be able to open the oven door without my glasses being totally clouded over by the steam from the fan oven. I am reminded of those glasses in the Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy, which go completely black when danger is there so you don't frighten yourself to death. I imagine a small robot trapped inside my oven door going "danger, Will Robinson", which dates me, I know.

I will be able to have a hairstyle with a damn good fringe, without looking like I start from the nose down like something out of Sesame Street, and I will be able to go on roller coasters without worrying whether the centrifugal force is enough to keep my glasses on. I probably shan't because I am terrified of heights and a real wimp about those sorts of things - but I could.

So until next wednesday, itchy and scratchy will get a fair trial, m'lud. At the moment the jury is out, but the stakes are high as are my hopes.

Well - that was the 'can I use a computer in these lenses?' test. Not too bad. I think I need to do the 'can I watch telly in them?' test now. Toodle pip dudes.