Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve gotten to a point where the small collection of thought provoking posts which have served to enhance the intestinal fortitude of some and trouble the delicate constitutions of others is about to perform a swan song.

Hang on a minute, I gotta reset the WiFi.

Ok, now that I’ve realized I don’t need immediate connectivity to continue composing this line of bull, I’m back.

The month of January, 2018, the last of which that I will spend in my 40’s, saw me wrapping up a marathon of visits to the ophthalmologist so as to rid me, the internet, and this earth in general of the genetically born hyperopic assault on my ability to properly interpret the surrounding environment using light in the visible spectrum reflected by objects in said environment.

I’m talking about my vision, y’all.

I got it fixed.

This last week when I went in for a follow up, my vision tested at 20/25, save for a ‘V’ that I called ‘Y’.

Now if I were going to follow the standard cookie cutter approach of describing the process to correct my vision, that would be pretty gosh darned boring.

Certainly I could tell you about the process the anesthesiologist used to deaden each of my eyes as a prelude to granting me the ability to read small font.  I could go into further detail with that approach and describe how that particular process left me with a nasty black eye on the right side, yet no visible evidence of assault on the left.

But I won’t.  For that part, I’ll refer you to the picture where I used software to accentuate the drama of the bruise.  Compare that to some melted cheese on a slice of pizza and I dare you to tell me the difference.

Instead, my dear reader, I’m going to tell you about one particular innocuous (or maybe not so innocuous) remark I heard in the office one day last month while in the process of having various pre-surgical measurements done on my eyes.

Before I do that, I should take this opportunity to advise you of the demographic in which my ophthalmologist falls.

Young.

Female.

Did I mention Asian descent?

Generally speaking, you know you’re getting old when any one of your doctors is considerably younger than you.  This was the first one I’ve encountered, and I’m honestly still trying to get used to that notion.  I don’t discount her youth though.  I just discount the fact that I’m getting older.

Remember in the movie Ferris Bueller’s Day Off where Ferris was talking his way into a fancy restaurant and the snooty Maitre D’ made a comment about how he wept for the future?  I’m part of that generation he was griping about.

Okay, let’s move along.

Whenever one is preparing to have the type of surgery I had, it’s necessary for the eye doctor to get measurements of the patient’s eyes.  Here in the technology laden 21st century, this process involves the patient looking into a series of machines that display little pictures of hot air balloons and copulating squirrels so that other programs within the machine can take all of the necessary measurements.  One of the issues I encountered was that my eyes wouldn’t open wide enough, so members of the in-house brute squad were called in to hold my eyelids open.

Once the dry eye torture was complete, I was escorted by my young, female doctor of Asian descent to a waiting area where my surgery would be scheduled.  I was asked to have a seat next to a lady whom I guessed to be in her mid-seventies.  Her daughter and my fellow Gen-Xer sat next to her.

Upon seeing my doctor escort me to my seat and then walk off, the septuagenarian made a comment to her daughter loud enough for everyone in the area to hear.

“Chinese.”

“Huh?”  inquired the daughter.

“We should get Chinese for dinner tonight.”

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, near sighted and far.  I can think of no better way to sign off on all of the glorious tales of my bad vision and it’s redemption than to share that particular story.

For all we know, that lady was thinking about warming up last night’s meatloaf for dinner that night.  We’ll never know if it was my doctor that inspired the change of menu.

Better one, better two?

Better one.