I've been wearing glasses since the second grade. When my mother first noticed that perhaps her darling daughter couldn't see, she took me to the optometrist in the mall (Pearl Vision yo!) to get checked out.
I did not want glasses. At all. It probably didn't help that my mom started the conversation with, "Hmm, I think you might need glasses." I swore up and down that I could see just FINE and I didn't need any geeky, nerdy stupid glasses.
I was also about 8 years old and didn't know any better.
We went and confirmed that I was not anywhere close to 20/20 vision. I was really upset. Looking back, I'm not really sure why I was so upset but I think it had something to do with the fact that anyone on TV who wore glasses was a stereotypical nerdy character like that Velma girl on Scooby-Doo.
Anyway, to soften the blow my mother told me that I could have any frames I wanted. Any! In the whole store! And you know what I said?
We were a family that preferred to buy things on sale. Even at the age of 8 I knew that a sure way to get my mom to buy me something was if I said, "But Mom. It's ON SALE." When she told me I could have full price glasses I knew this was a special day.
And what did I choose with all of that buying power? Something snazzy? Stylish? Flattering? Maybe even bedazzled?
NO. I DID NOT CHOOSE ANY OF THOSE.
I chose a licensed pair of glasses by Pink Panther (????) that were pink and white and very big and round. Granted, I loved pink. (To my credit, big and round glasses were sort of in in the 80's.) But someone should have told me that Pepto-pink is not for glasses and definitely not for glasses on me. Have you ever seen a more awkward second grader with reading skills far above her grade level?
I mean, REALLY.
When we went to get the glasses I was startled at how much I could actually see. You have to remember, up until then I didn't know that the way I saw the world wasn't normal. My mother walked me out of that place and I just kept exclaiming over and over again,
"Mom! I can SEE!!! I can SEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!"
The way I was prancing out of that mall with my Pink Panther glasses you would have thought I was a miracle Helen Keller or something.
My parents thankfully let me wear contacts in the 7th grade (which also mysteriously coincided with my rise in popularity at school) and I've been wearing them ever since. I don't wear glasses often and don't have too many problems with contacts.
(I've never really believed the hype about laser surgery. I know far too many people who had to wear contacts at a lower prescription afterwards or even had the surgery slowly wear off over the years. Also, the idea of lasers on my eyes give me nervous tummy - thanksbutno.)
I had several different frames through grade school and most were big and round with brown/pink colors.
Allow me to present the third grade and my awesome ponytails:
And, the sixth grade:
(Shut up, you know you had awesome bangs like this too.)
(And NO, I will not post a picture from the seventh grade when I got a perm the summer before. Just....no.)
Finally, in about 1995 I got some very simple wire frames and I never strayed back to thick plastic frames. HOORAY FOR ME. Ever since, the biggish plasticky frames have always carried a nuance of,
"Don't go back there. It's like the bangs and the purple legwarmers and jelly shoes. Don't even think about doing that again. The 80's are O-V-E-R."
Flash forward to today - more than 20 years later. Last week when I was choosing frames for the 8th or 9th time, I paused. My first instinct was to go for another version of simple wire frames.
But since all the cool kids are finally wearing them, I felt like it was time to take another look at plastic and try some of those edgy, chunky styles that everyone seems to loving. I couldn't go all the way with some really squared off, thick frames but I like these well enough. (And thank you to everyone who said I should go for it. You totally pushed me over the edge.)
For a person who comes from a scary history with big, thick, plastic pink glasses I think these are a HUGE improvement from the Pink Panther frames. It only took me 22 years to get here. Phew.





