No Luminary

[Scene: Work, CNU Information Technology Services Helpdesk, McMurran 108 Office, I sit at my work computer in front of a window into the computer lab, a heavy-set lady is collecting her print-job from the printer.]

HER: Where are your glasses?
ME: . . . Huh?
HER: Don't you wear glasses? You're doing an awful lot of squinting.
ME: No, I don't wear glasses. They wouldn't help.
HER: Oh, really, why not?
ME: I have an eye disease.
HER: Oh . . . Well, I feel like an ass.
[I grunt noncommitally, thinking: Good.]

You have no idea how often this happens to me, how often someone asks me if I wear glasses or where the glasses are that I so obviously need, or comment about my squinting or how close I am holding something while reading.

[Scene: Dormitory apartment, I sit on the couch in the common room reading the first collection of Fable, the girlfriend of a friend (who lives here) skips into the room.]

HER: Hey! You're holding that awful close to your face!
[I noncommitally grunt, concentrating on the comic.]
HER: Do you wear glasses?
ME: No, they wouldn't help.
HER: Oh! I have to wear glasses . . . Poor me!
[She exits, frollicking away.]
ME: . . .

Yeah, you know what? Maybe I don't want to nigh on constantly talk to strangers about my uncureable, untreatable eye disease? Maybe I don't need your opinion as an amateur optometrist? Maybe not everyone who can't see well needs glasses? This kind of shit is fucking rude and happens everyday about.

[Scene: CNU Student Centre Lounge, a group of couches and armchair, I sit on a couch drawing in a sketchbook, a girl sits across from me with a textbook.]

HER: Why wouldn't glasses help you see better?
[I launch into a five minute explanation of macular degeneration, Cone-Rod Distrophy, and Stargardt's Disease.]
HER: Wow, that was way too much information.
ME: . . .

Fucking can't even win for losing. Don't even get me started on the colour blindness.