The Name's Parker, Peter Parker

A funny thing happened on the way to the park. Except I didn’t go to the park. It just doesn’t sound as good to say, “A funny thing happened to me on the way through the kitchen today.” That statement, however, would be closer to the truth.

As I strode through my kitchen earlier today, I plucked my eyeglasses from the countertop with the intention of balancing them on the bridge of my nose in order to see the things around me a little clearer. Being nearsighted I do not always need them around the house, as I have no trouble viewing objects nearer to me. It must be said that I still find it easier to navigate my way through the obstacle course on my floor, what with all of the toy trucks and dinosaurs laying about in wait to gouge my tender tootsies, when I can see a few feet in front of me and plan my path.

So, as I said at the beginning of the last paragraph, I removed my eyeglasses from the countertop where they were doing me no service, and positioned them in front of my eyeballs.

That’s odd, I thought to myself, was I seeing better without them?

I took them off and held them up to the light to determine whether they were bleary.

Nope, they look all right.

I slid them up the bridge of my nose and looked about the room again.

Hmmm…that is strange.

This had me perplexed. I felt very much like Peter Parker after he had been bitten by the spider and realized that he didn’t need his glasses anymore; aside from the fact that he also grew some mad biceps and was suddenly able to spin a web and climb up the face of buildings. My biceps weren’t growing any larger and I didn’t feel any super-powers coursing through my veins, so I concluded that there must be a more logical explanation for my current conundrum. Something much less exciting, more boring and ordinary.

Choosing an object with which to test my eyesight, I gazed upon it and slowly raised and lowered my glasses. It seemed to me that I could indeed see better without them. I picked an object further away and tried again. My eyes failed this experiment although I noted that I could not see as well as I ought with the glasses on either.

I rubbed my eyes. Not long before, I had inhaled some fluid down the wrong tube and it caused my eyes to water from the force of my coughing. It was possible that my damp lashes were smearing my lenses. I wiped my eyes. No change. Should I call my mother? Should I ask God if He had decided to fix my eyes even though I didn’t look upon this particular weakness with dismay, as it wasn’t all that troublesome. (Granted one does get tired of baby fingerprints being imprinted upon everything one looks at.) What is a person do in these situations?

Well, I decided the least dramatic thing to do would be to wash the lenses, just in case they held some invisible grime, and try again. I walked to the sink, squirted some soap onto my thumb and index finger, and brought them together over my right lens. Or where my right lens should be.

My mind rewound to the scene a few moments earlier when, reaching for something behind them on the counter, my son had knocked my eyeglasses to the floor. I hadn’t thought anything of it; just picked them up and put them back where they were.

That explained a lot. Peering through only one lens has the tendency to make a person’s eyesight go wacky and make them think that maybe they’re the next Spider-Man. I felt like a dope. Truly. It was with much relief that I located the missing lens and replaced it into its assigned socket. Sigh. And I thought that by nightfall I might be leaping from rooftops and suspending the children from opposite sides of the room by thick homespun Spidey silk.