Still Giggling

When I was 9 years old I went in for the eye exam that would lead me to my first pair of eyeglasses.

They were the Clark Kent model that made me look a lot like that kid on ‘My Three Sons’.

There are a couple of photos of me wearing those glasses and I once showed it to my Mom and asked:

“Why? Did you hate me?”

She laughed and doubled down on her thought that I was cute.

I went for an eye exam last night. The doctor was a 30-something female and she put me in the chair with my chin on the rest and had me look on at the letters.

I started laughing.

She just looked at me, and of course, we held up the exam. I told her the story.

“I was 9 years old and I had this really old guy doing my eye exam. He was breathing so hard and he’d look into my eyes and then hum. Well, I started giggling and I couldn’t stop. Every time we tried to get back to it, I giggled. My Mom was with me, and she started laughing too, and this old bastard just got so mad at both of us. He held up his hand and said, ‘Get out of my chair.’”

The woman before me listened to the story and laughed along with me. She was extremely patient.

“Funny what your mind brings back to you,” I said. “I’ll never have an eye exam and not think about that.”

We got back to the business at hand.

“You wear glasses?” She asked.

“When I drive.”

“You can get by without them,” she said. “Your left eye near sight is 20/20. Your right eye far sight is 20/20.”

“Is that new?”

“No,” she said. “Always been that way, but the funny part is that your eyesight has improved since your last visit.”

Weird.

On the way home, I thought about that 50 year old eye exam and I giggled again.

Then it hit me.

I never really needed glasses!

Mom put me in those Clark Kent’s for shits and giggles it seems!