I got new glasses this week. I know that probably doesn't sound all that eventful, but for me it is. It's been over five years since I got a new pair and I was feeling it was time. I have perfectly servicable tortoise shell and rimless specs that I still love. But still I felt I needed a new pair. I wear them everyday and am not always kind to them, so they take a beating.
Usually glasses shopping is a dismal failure, like trying on pants. This time it was so easy. I had some time to kill and moseyed into LensCrafters which was oddly empty. I went in thinking vintage cat eye specs. I had to laugh at those and the clerk joined me saying "You may want those, but your face says no way." Then she started pulling frames that were more the shape that look good on me, but that also had that same vintage feel, some even had a little flair at the corner. By the time we were done, I had a half dozen pairs that I really liked and one that made me feel all zoomy inside. A lovely dark teal green that just shouted I belong with you.
The zoomy pair had a price tag of $250 that made me feel decidedly less zoomy. I had her put them aside anyway. I needed an eye exam before I could make the purchase, so I would have to wait and I have learned not to impulse buy things with the big ticket price. I got home that night and there was a coupon in the mail for $100 off glasses at LensCrafters. Zoomy feeling returned.
I got my eye exam a week later on a snowy day. The store oddly empty again. The woman helping me this time had spectacular spectacles that were hand painted in France and we chatted and laughed as she rang my order and did all the calculations. Her 30% off trumped my $100 coupon by a mile. We discovered we both loved Dauphin Island, a place most folks don't even know exists and it would be fine if it stayed that way. The only disappointment is that they no longer do glasses in an hour and I would have to return.
When I picked the glasses up a couple days later, the tech from the back fitted them for me. He was a man about my age. He seemed happy to be out of the stock room and I can't say I blame him. Months in the scope room made me crazy and any excuse to leave it was a treat. I didn't notice anything about him except his hands. His fingers were long and calloused, the nails short. I expected his touch to be rough. Instead, it was soft, almost a caress, but without all that sexual bullshit. More the way a parent would touch a child. There was such tenderness in it. I sat in my chair poleaxed by this feeling of comfort coming from a complete stranger, a man stranger, and a man stranger who didn't seem to want into my pants. I was baffled by it and days later I am still thinking about what the feel of his fingers was like as it brushed back my hair, slid the glasses on my face and tested them for fit. Slow, gentle, easy.
I wore them out the door. I feel amazing with them on. Bouncy and full of sass.
Due to a slight change in the prescription, there's a little parallax that I'm adjusting to that oddly makes me feel taller and somehow thinner. No lie. I'm sure my eyes will adjust, but I'm kinda hoping they won't.
One of my friends called them magic specs and I think that's about right.
No comments:
Post a Comment