The Oculus by Mario Ramirez

On any given day, at any given moment, I'll get a quirky look and the most typical of queries: What's it like to be blind? Well I wouldn't know because I have never been there. If visual acuity were scaled from one to ten, I am a 6.5. I can see. Close up. Even then I have trouble. It saddens me; I hate my glasses. It's not so much about looking like a square, but that they don't help as much as I need them to. Preposterous says my optometrist, ridiculous say my-let me find the right word, associates. Sorry, lol. Anyway, it shouldn't matter because you don't care. I need my glasses to let me know what's heading my way. Yes, it is getting spiritual and allegorical. I can't meander my way through life only avoiding what is big enough to make a difference. And I definitely can not afford to hit any more damn speed bumps or potholes. Dear Congress and Mr. President: fix my fucking roads as soon as possible. Yup, I understand your laughter. I guess it's the American thing to do, rely on those with money and power to fix our maladies. The worst thing about glasses is having them be perfect the first three weeks. It was amazing, as if Mother Earth decided to convert to Blu-Ray just for me! Then I dropped them-on gravel the first time. Ouch, but still no biggie. I continued to don them, now on the daily because Stevie said they looked good; I listened. Big mistake. The black rimmed, ocular devices are crooked so my perception has forever changed to one of lopsided squints. Squints? Yes squints; the glass or cheap plastic itself acquired so many scratches and dinks that I'd be safer off looking through a shitty kaleidoscope. So much for the permanent High Definition. My Blu-Rays were skipping not one, but all beats, and the horse I rode in on can't handle the obstacles in the road. That leaves me fucked, depressed, and just a tad bit stressed. I don't know what to do about it- it's on my agenda so I suppose that it will be addressed, eventually. For now, I'll settle with being ocularly disadvantaged, I'd rather be confined to permanent darkness then seeing what more destruction the Homo Sapien has wrought.