Cheesy song titles

“I can see clearly now, the rain is gone…” be doo be do bee…. On March 27th I had laser surgery to correct my crazy level of nearsightedness. I can now see 20/15, instead of what I was before. I don’t actually know what the numbers were - whatever it is when things are in focus for five inches past your nose. I had to wear glasses to do just about everything except visit the bathroom in the middle of the night. I used to wear contacts, but in college they started to bother my eyes so since then I’ve only worn them for things like mountain biking, or sledding in a blizzard. To be able to see without any assistance at all is… amazing. After a week of healing I’m starting to “see” the benefits.

The actual surgery sucks. Anyone who tells you “it’s a piece of cake” is lying, or the valium they give people helped them forget. It only takes about 10 minutes, but it just… sucks. (Patty, if you’re reading this, stop now. Seriously. You won’t like me if you don’t.) It doesn’t hurt much, and I know statistics say it’s pretty safe, but it still sucks to have your eyes held open and then have antibiotic goop smeared under your eye lids, five kinds of drops dropped in, a suction ring applied, flap cut, laser zappage (really the least unpleasant part actually) and finally the worst part of all, which they don’t warn you about - dum dum dummm - they rinse the corneal flap with some sort of liquid/water thing to make sure there’s no debris before folding it back over your eye. This doesn’t sound that bad. But it is. Because it you can feel it. And it feels like they’re rinsing the inside of your eye ball. It’s really, really hideous. For me, anyway, it was worse than the smell of burning eye ball, and the suction ring pressure. But I handled it all like I trooper by thinking nasty thoughts about the surgeon and the assistant girls who kept saying perkily “you’re doing great!”. Grrr.

But AFTER all that (and after 5 days of sleeping in a plastic mask, of which I shall not post a picture, unless I can get Mike to model it) when my eyes healed a bit - it is splendid. I can see so clearly! And in the middle of the night! And when I shave my legs in the shower! And the very very very best part, at least so far since I can’t bike or ski for awhile yet, then that will be the best part, is that I can walk outside when it’s raining or snowing and not get spots on my glasses. It’s amazing. Because there are few things more annoying than getting spots on your glasses while your bundled up and wearing gloves and thus can’t easily dry your glasses. I know, my life is hard. But still. I saved up for 3 years to have this done, and I’m so so happy.

Today Ampersand and I walked down to the mercantile to buy some dinner supplies. With typical spring consistency it was sunny when we left and raining when we came back. And I didn’t care. I walked around an extra ten minutes just because I could.

Here is me, after 30 minutes in the rain. Obviously not raining all that hard, but that’s good because it’s still unnecessarily wintery here.