07 July 2001 ~ I believe my own eyes...

Something very, very weird happened to me a few weeks ago. I'm not sure why I haven't mentioned it until now, but now that I have a few minutes and I'm thinking of it, I may as well...

It was about four or five in the morning, just before the sun came up, on a Friday morning. I'd woken up to use the bathroom, and was trying to be super-quiet because my friend Brian was sleeping. So I tiptoed past him with a little smile, and went to do my thing...

...So I did my thing, realizing I hadn't bothered to pick up my glasses on the way to the bathroom. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't, sometimes I fall asleep with the fuckers on, so it doesn't really matter. It's not a really big deal, anyway; I know where the bathroom is, and where the toilet paper is, so I don't really need to see; that is, unless I get in there and feel like reading one of my little punk zines for awhile, but at four or five in the morning, who wants to do that?

Anyway, so I didn't bother reading the punk zines, and I managed to find the toilet paper with half-closed eyes, and I sort of rinsed off my hands in the sink, and was about to turn off the light, when I saw something absolutely astounding...

The chain to turn the light on and off hangs directly in front of the mirror. So, by necessity, I looked in the mirror, and I saw...... myself.

To a seeing person, this is no big deal. But I'm about as near-sighted as possible without needing a guide-dog. My glasses have been permanently attached to my face every day since I was six years old. Without them, I literally cannot read a book without pressing it to my nose. At the age of three, I could not see the smoke rising off the Great Smoky Mountains and I thought my parents were lying to me about its magnificence. If I take my glasses off at this moment, I cannot see the words on the computer screen, can't even really see the text-boxes to type in, just a big whitish screen. When I go for eye examinations and physicals, I cannot see the big "E" on the chart. Sometimes, I have trouble seeing the chart.

I don't remember EVER seeing myself in a mirror without glasses. I mean, probably I have, but certainly not since I was younger than six.

This night, I stood there and just stared. I reached up and poked at my eyes to make SURE I wasn't wearing glasses. I looked around the rest of the room to see if I could see anything else. I was absolutely astounded to find I could actually SEE things. I DON'T know why. I have NO idea why this happened. All I know is that suddenly, I WASN'T blind as a bat anymore. Things were still out of focus, sort of blurry, as though someone had smeared a light coat of translucent paint over a photograph. But I could make out objects! I could see myself in the mirror! I could distinguish each bottle of nail polish on my windowsill! I could SEE where the toilet paper was instead of justing blindly reaching! I could SEE MYSELF in the mirror!

I saw my mouth fall open, and it was like watching somebody else; I didn't even recognize myself really. It was like looking at a photograph or a movie of someone else. I made a few faces at myself. I could SEE them! I was no longer this pitiful, vulnerable little thing who had to grope around for things and hope they were in the right places. I was a vulnerable-looking person in the mirror, a little scared and a little funny-looking; I sort of looked like a little possessed girl in a movie, there in my nightgown, wide-eyed and pale.

But what is one supposed to do at four in the morning when something bizarre like that happens? Despite being shocked, I was still awfully tired, so I went back to bed, sort of watching behind me at the face in the mirror receding into a fuzzy blur. I tiptoed back to the living room, trying not to wake Brian up, and went back to sleep.

In the morning, I took my glasses off to brush my hair, but I couldn't see a thing. Just a whitish blur in the mirror. I moved my face closer and closer to the mirror until I could make out distinct features, but my nose was rubbing against the glass before I could see my eyes.

I have no explanation for what happened that evening. Maybe I imagined it. Maybe it was a very, very vivid dream. Maybe it was a mono-induced hallucination. Maybe I'd had too much to drink that night. Maybe it was some sort of miracle. Well, come to think of it, it WAS some sort of miracle, because never before had anything like this happened; it was really against ALL odds that I'd be able to SEE without my stupid glasses for ten minutes in the middle of a hot summer night. I don't know why it happened, and I guess maybe I never will. I guess for a long time, I'll be lugging my glasses around with me everywhere I go, strapped to my face like a weird form of life-support.

But for ten amazing minutes...

~H.T.*