Aging Is NOT For Sissies

Okay, so it's inevitable. I need bifocals. There is something cosmically unfair about having been nearsighted My. Entire. Life. and now not being even able to see close either. But, when the optometrist clicked the little lens over my eyes and said "Here's what your prescription would be...and here...is what bifocals would do for you" there was no choice. Bifocals it is.

But not just bifocals. Oh no. Because I need to have protection from bright light--watching that tender skin around the eyes and trying to forstall wrinkles for a bit longer. So, I need sunglasses. Okay, so, frames with clip-on sunglass lenses.

First of all, there is no way "clip on" and "cool" will EVER go together. Clip on earrings? No. Clip on tie? No. Clip on sunglasses? You've never seen it in Vogue and you never will.

So, try the darkening lenses--you know, the kind that when you go out in the light turn all dark, so that when you go back inside you can't see anything? Actually, for me, they never quite go all the way light, so I walk around looking like I'm trying to hide my eyes because I'm stoned. I might as well BE stoned, if I'm going to look like I am, right?

But. Darkening lenses? Not the entire solution, because they don't darken when you are driving. Something about the nature of the light that comes through the windshield does NOT trigger the darkening effect. So you need sunglasses too. Second set of prescription sunglasses? Suck it up and go for the clip ons.

Because you still need regular sunglasses for when you wear contacts. AND reading glasses for when you wear your contacts. And you need several pair of both, because you tend to take off the sunglasses and/or reading glasses when you're done with their immediate use. And you put them down. And then you don't remember where that was.

Which is really a bitch when you do that with the bifocals, because then you can't see well enough to find them again.

I have found myself juggling several pair of glasses at the same time--what do I do if I want to read in the sunlight? What if I'm driving at night? What do I do when the $16 reading glasses I got at the grocery store are SO MUCH CUTER than the $400 automatically darkening clip on lensed bifocals I got from the eye doctor?

Like I said. It's not for sissies.