Glasses

I started wearing glasses at nine years old. They were turquoise and large and I looked very silly. But at nine years old, I felt pretty super cool wearing them because as far as I was concerned, they were a mark of smartness. The mark of someone smart enough to come up with a better word than smartness. Cleverness? Intellectualism? Whatever. Point was, I was less concerned with looking attractive and more concerned with my teachers liking me and writing nice notes on my tests.
Obviously as I grew older my priorities began to change and suddenly adding glasses to the mix of giant fluffy hair, legs of disproportionate size to my body, and practically translucent skin was terribly unappealing. So I stopped wearing them.
But...could you SEE? you might ask. The answer is no, no I could not see. From age 12 to age 16 I wandered around in a cloudy haze, not even completely sure of what my friends looked like, which occasionally caused minor problems when I arrived late to the cafeteria.
At 16, I changed my life by getting myself contacts.
I hate wearing glasses. I hate the way they look, I hate the way they feel, I hate the way I have to take them off and on when I eat or read so I don't get a headache. Also I hate the way they look. But for eight years now it's all been okay, because I wear my contacts most of the time.
And then June happened. June did a large number of unhealthy things to me, including giving me the Eye Infection That Would Not Die. The doctor tells me it is minor, and it certainly feels minor, but it means: No Contacts. For an Indeterminate Amount of Time. Thus far an Indeterminate Amount of Time has been very nearly two months and is beginning to look more like an Interminable Amount of Time.
Here we come to the Poor Decision Making. While I was a teenager, wandering around totally blind was acceptable because I was a teenager, and teenagers are stupid. Now, however, I am 24 years old, and for a month now, I have done a lot of stupid things without wearing my glasses. Going on walks, to dinner, to bars, to clubs, on dates...
It is one thing to go out with your close friends and say, "Just make sure you don't leave without me" and another to be on a first date standing painfully close not because it is a key part of your seduction technique but because you are afraid if he moves much farther away you won't be able to pick him out of the crowd.
This, clearly, cannot be allowed to go on. And yet my vanity is so monstrous that I cannot overcome it with common sense. So I'm trying uncommon sense. I went out and spent money I don't have on an expensive pair of chic red designer glasses in the hope that my love of wearing things that are red and expensive will trump my hatred of looking at myself in glasses.
The most smartest solution possible. Clearly. We'll see how well it works after I finally pick them up this week.