It would have to be sunny today. We were schedualed to have our eyes checked at 10:30 and after the diilation we had to wear dark glasses for the rest of the day. I had forgotten that it was Ash Wednesday until I spotted a couple in the waiting room with smudges on their foreheads. Dr. Goodfriend asked me if I had noticed any changes in my vision and I told him I find myself taking my glasses off to read the really tiny print on labels. I’m not used to that. I haven’t taken them off since I got them in 5th grade.
He got his microscopic light out and said, “I’m gonna ask you to look to the left, one eye at a time.” He shined the light in my eye and there was a long pause before he said. “Look to the left,” as if I hadn’t heard him. I told him you said you were “gonna ask me to look to the left.” He didn’t find that funny. I tried to get back on his good side by describing how wild it was when I walked out of Waldert’s on Mount Hope Avenue with my first pair of glasses. As dramatic as the first time I took LSD. He chuckled.
Once back in the waiting room I picked out some new glasses for my new prescription. Rather the optician picked them out for me. He basically told me my current glasses, the ones I’ve been wearing for 7 or 8 years, were too wide for my face. I have a prism in both lenses and he got out a piece of paper to illustrate how the prism works. His drawing reminded me of Steve Hoy‘s sci fi influenced work and I made a point of taking it with me.
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