I can see!

After a couple years of squinting at everything, I got glasses. I still squint at everything because I don’t wear my glasses. People keep saying: what about contact lenses? What about them? They sound annoying. Finally the annoyance of contacts has been outweighed by the annoyance of not being able to see.

I make an eye appointment. The eye doctor fits me with a pair of contacts. Then he sets me up in front of a mirror. He tells me,

“We’re going to practice taking them out and putting them in.”
I take them out easily. He says,
“Some people say that’s the hard part. Now lets try putting them in.”
I have a feeling most people don’t say that’s hard part.
I know millions of people do this no problem and that someday I’ll be a pro, maybe. But right now it’s counter intuitive. I’m supposed to stick my finger in and touch my eyeball. My eyeball is smart. It knows that foreign objects like fingers should not be touching it. 
Despite holding my eyelids apart, every time my finger comes close, my eyelids snap shut and the contact flutters to the counter. Where’s the contact? Over and over I try to put it in and then spend a decent amount of time looking for a small clear lens.
After what feels like an eternity of trying to get them in, with the eye doctor playing cheerleader over my shoulder, I succeed. He offers,
“You can stay here and practice as much as you’d like or you can practice at home.”
As much fun as that sounds, “I’ll practice at home.”
And by practice I mean I will struggle for 20 minutes each day until they are in and then I’ll practice taking them out at night. I will practice once a day.

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