Don’t be jealous, but I kind of rocked my eye exam last week.
I always get nervous when I have to do the eye tests, especially the peripheral vision game. That’s the one where you stare straight ahead at a little dot on a screen, and then every time you detect some wavy lines in your field of vision, you click a handheld device that resembles the lovechild of an original Mac mouse and a vibrator. I get nervous for a couple of reasons.
- I’m usually jacked up on caffeine when I go in for my exam, so wavy lines are going to happen whether I’m staring down the barrel of an optical instrument or not.
- I’m afraid I’ll let down the optometrist.
See, I think optometrists judge us after we leave. I feel similarly about personal trainers, bank tellers, therapists, and — less conjecturally — Republicans. I always imagine a big group of optical care professionals having lunch at a casual dining establishment and one of them being like, “Hey, I had one this morning who could only make it to line two!” And then they all share a hearty laugh, a few back slaps (completely heterosexual, of course), and some stuffed jalapeños (completely heterosexual, of course).
I think my fear of ophthalmological chagrin has to do with natural selection. Because were it not for modern optics, I would have walked straight off a cliff or into oncoming traffic long ago. Or I might have been a quick and easy weeknight dinner for a small, on-the-go family of hyenas. I owe my continued existence to refractive technologies ((addiction — ad·dic·tion n. Habitual psychological and physiological dependence on a substance or practice beyond one’s voluntary control.)), and I don’t want to disappoint my dealer.
Thankfully, though, my fears were not realized, and not only did I get every single mother f***ing wavy line, but I also made it to line SIX on the letter chart. So I’ve made it another year.
Though he did tell me I may need reading glasses in the next few years, which I think is his own little way of keeping me humble.
