Aye-aye eye yi yi...

Almost a year later, I have two main thoughts about cataract surgery. The first is: I’m glad they can fix these things. The second is: Don’t let ‘em mess with your eyes if you don’t absolutely need it. But I did. Why I developed cataracts so soon...who knows? But the double-vision was worsening and uncorrectable, and impairing.

Now and forever I have two eyes with two different fixed foci. It’s a funny kind of choice to have to make. You’re told about it, and you do further research, and you conclude that the brains of most people who choose permanent monovision will adapt handily. (Monovision, though a counterintuitive name to my way of thinking, indicates that you have a single eye focused on distance, and a single eye focused on close or mid-range.) So, you pick, figuring that your brain darn well better be the accepting sort, because you only get one shot at this. (Your other main option is distance focus, both eyes, which means that you will, ever after, wear glasses for anything other than ship’s lookout duty.)

So I have monovision, and it’s a decent multipurpose way to view the world without corrective lenses...for the most part. For close-up work, spectacles remain essential. I do a lot of taking the specs on and off. Maybe I just haven’t adapted to the idea or feel of glasses as a full-time appendage. But it is a marvelous thing, what glasses do when you need ‘em.

It turns out that I also have some issues with intra-ocular lenses as full-time appendages. Light halos in the dark is one of the most annoying side-effects. This is particularly distracting at night, while driving. When your visual interface with the world is comprised of shapes and light patterns--as night driving primarily is--there is enough disadvantage compared to daylight. When each of those points of light--the stoplights, the headlights, the streetlights, and the reflections of all of those on rain-slicked asphalt--is “enhanced” by the appearance of its own halo, you end up with some significant visual cacophony. These halos are, more or less, an eyebrow-like arc running along the upper hemisphere of a light source, which overlaps with the arcs from every other light source in the night.

Then there are the moments--extended moments, generally--where I have the odd sensation that I’m not looking through my own eyes. Not sure, actually, whose eyes they are, but it can make one feel oddly disengaged from what is meant to be reality. (This may or may not be exacerbated by the fact that I am losing my hearing a bit. How old am I now, anyway?...is that all?...who ordered these parts and from where?--the Oriental Trading Company?)

Then there’s this--my eyes are dry. I think the surgical process sets you up for that. For this reason I am disinclined to move to Arizona, and may, in fact, opt for a rainforest, given my druthers.

Not so bad: The fact that my intraocular lenses reflect light at people in a way that might lead them to think I've been assimilated by the Borg. I have not. As far as I know.

Nevertheless, I cannot complain about the whiz-banging precision of the modern-day laser-ophthalmic surgical center high-tech assembly line. Or the relative ease of the surgery. Or the fact that I can now read comfortably with glasses. Or that I only see one of each distant object, as is appropriate.

I would prefer parts that don’t wear out, and mean to keep my joints forever, if at all possible. But my eyes’ original lenses gave up prematurely, and I am grateful for vision. Just let me say this--don’t do it if you don’t need it.