Spectacles

A word, if I may, about glasses.

I wear contacts, but I really should have a pair of glasses to wear in the event my contacts go kaphlooey, like they did today. Reduced to driving with one eye closed, a challenge I have now mastered, I realize the foolishness of being without an ocular backup plan, so I am now considering my options for a new pair of glasses.

Since the last time I bought glasses, styles have changed considerably. My last pair was a simple wire-rimmed pair, plain and sufficient, nothing special. I’ve watched trends come and go with some amazement that people will actually fall for the line of malarky being fed to them by the trend-makers.

For instance, I call these

“Blinders” glasses, in which the wearer cares nothing for the ability to see anything to either side. This is fine for movie theaters or hard-right/left-wing politicians, but for regular people, the importance of peripheral vision cannot be overstated. I can’t even drive with a hood on, I’m so concerned I won’t be able to see the unicyclist bolting around the corner, or a toddler chasing his pet wombat out into the street, or a little old lady exploring the downward limits to the accelerator.

I’m shocked at the number of people who wear such vision impediments simply because someone somewhere said they were “fashionable.” Glasses are supposed to help you see better, not limit your field of vision.

Also available are glasses for people who reallyreallyreally loved the 80s and never want them to end. Pink, large, with metal accents on the side, they look like glasses Shelly Hack would wear to make herself look as smart as Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson.

I expect these to be sold in the costume section, with bell-bottoms and a polyester shirt with a big bow on it. Yes, I know bows on shirts are back in fashion now, but I would sooner wear them than wear the goofy pink 80s glasses. They looked ridiculous then, they look ridiculous now.

Another option is the cats-eye frames, shown here in a more subdued version that makes them almost tolerable. The problem is that they’re so evocative of the silver-framed, bejeweled cats-eye glasses popular in the 70s that all I see is Sister Mary Michael from St. Patrick’s Elementary School grabbing Andy Grabowski by the ear and scolding him for not cleaning his desk. These are, therefore, the Angry Nun glasses. I just can’t wear them.

There are the multi-colored-stripes reading glasses that dance from beaded chains on the bosom of 70 year old women with fake nails, the inexplicably rectangular glasses that render one-third of the lenses useless as they rest upon the cheekbone well beneath the eye socket, the glasses with one color showing to the outside and a different color facing the wearer–secret-identity glasses! you think I am a dark-frame person, but REALLY I’m a PINK frame person and you will NEVER KNOW–HA HA!!–and black plastic frames with “bling” embedded in the sides. I’m so glad the Paris-Hilton-Bedazzler days are over. All that lame (accent aigu) gave me a headache.

The pair I want is equally derisible, though I would argue that they fall into the “classics” category. I want a simple pair of tortoise shell glasses, possibly in a horn-rimmed style, but plain, plastic, a little clunky but wholly utilitarian. I just need something to wear at night when I take out my contacts.

This is the only pair even close, but even these scream “Poindexter”, and are probably accompanied by a Kick-Me sign.

I have several weeks before I will be purchasing new glasses, so there’s time to find the right pair. But I already know I won’t be getting bedazzled Angry Nun blinders from the 80s. Not this time.