Girls Who Wear Glasses

Image- Pinterest

I had braces for 3 years.  That may give you some idea of how out of whack my teeth were as an adolescent.  My dad used to say I could eat corn on the cob through a picket fence.  Even with good insurance, he still referred to my braces as "the trip to Hawaii."  I had them removed just a few weeks into high school.  I was perfect, for about a month.

Then, one day in math class, my teacher asked me to do the problem written on the blackboard.  "There's something written on the blackboard?" I said, which was both smart-ass and true.  I couldn't see a damn thing on it.  So, off I went for an eye exam, and, sure enough, I needed glasses.  I was not pleased.  Hipsters hadn't yet been spawned by the devil, and the only people who wore glasses were nerds and old people.



There was one place to get glasses in my town, and the options were depressing at best. I hated my new glasses, which, in case you're interested, were huge and round, and a sort of ombre brown plastic.  I wouldn't be caught dead in them, so I only wore them in class, when absolutely necessary.  As soon as the bell rang, I'd rip them off my face and shove them into my pencil case, because you had to look good for hallway socializing. (This helped cement my reputation as an imperious bitch who ignored people; I couldn't see past the end of my own nose, so if you waved at me from any distance, I would not acknowledge you.)

That pair of glasses had an ignominious life, but a glorious death.  I broke my "no glasses in public" rule at my first Springsteen concert.  I was fairly sure Bruce wouldn't be turned off my my specs, since my nosebleed seats had me about half a mile away from the stage.  Without them, I wouldn't have seen a thing.  During the second encore, someone standing near me was waving their arms 80s dance style, and hit me in the face, just hard enough to knock my glasses off.  I juggled them a bit, then lost control, and watched them go tumbling into a sea of Levi's and spilled beer.

Since then, my glasses have gotten much nicer, which is good, because my vision has gotten worse, and now it's all I can do to get to the bathroom in the morning without them.  I rocked some big red ones in the late 80s, and a wire rimmed John Lennon-ish pair in the 90s, before settling in to the classic tortoiseshell look.  My current glasses are Tiffany, with a blue accent, and the branding on the arm isn't noticeable.  I guess I owe hipsters a debt of gratitude for making glasses seem cool.