glasses

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Bifocals

Glamorize your glassesI just got new bifocals.

I needed new glasses desperately.

I like my new glasses very much, but I look like a hipster/schoolmarm in a graphic novel by R. Crumb or Alison Bechdel.

I can see myself again.

Although I was fascinated when I recently mistook a black iron fence for a human being, I didn’t particularly want to end up in Oliver Sacks’ The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. Everything blurry, pretending not to care, pretending I was an Impressionist painter, I knew I needed new glasses, but you know how it is:  if you’re able to see at all, you’re too busy to go to the ophthalmologist/optometrist/optician or whomever you see.

And so I went to the “optical” guy.

And my vision has actually improved, so I needed new bifocals to reflect that.

When I picked out new frames, I held my old glasses up to get an idea what they looked like.

I didn’t know what they looked like until I picked them up.

It is amazing to be able to see again.

On a recent occasion, before I collected my new glasses,  I picked up my purse upside down from a counter at the supermarket.  Change, keys, and comb went flying.  Several people went down on their hands and knees to help me pick things up .  “Oh, a butterscotch candy,” I muttered in deep embarrassment.  I felt like Mr. Magoo, or Ms. Magoo.

So you can see why I’m happy to have new glasses.

There’s just one thing.  When I try to comment at blogs, I STILL can’t see those letters you have to type in first.  You know what I mean: tiny print all running together, and you have to type it in twice or thrice till you get it right.

I thought I’d be able to look at it and get it right the first time with my new glasses.

Nope.

Nobody can.

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Glasses & Dover Books

op row: Dorothy Parker, Zora Neale Hurston, Shirley Jackson, Gael Greene. Bottom row: Patti Smith, Susan Sontag, Tama Janowitz, Kate Christensen.

Dorothy Parker, Zora Neale Hurston, Shirley Jackson, Gael Greene, Patti Smith, Susan Sontag, Tama Janowitz, & Kate Christensen.

Where are these writers’ glasses?

Do you know any writers without glasses?

I have new glasses.

It’s liberating.

I was going for a professorial look.

My husband tells me I didn’t get it.

They’re bigger and rounder.

When I walk the wind doesn’t blow in my eyes as it did with my much smaller glasses.

In summer the bugs won’t fly in my eyes.  (This is a problem with bicycling.)

It was hard to find any glasses I liked.

I’ve worn wire-rimmed glasses since high school.  Well, most of the time.

It was time for a new look, I was told.

I tried on any number of Malcolm X glasses.  I didn’t realize they were Malcolm X glasses until I squinted at myself in the mirror.

Malcolm X

Malcolm X

Meg Ryan’s big glasses are adorable in When Harry Met Sally.  Perhaps they’re bigger than is fashionable today.

Meg Ryan in "When Harry Met Sally"

Meg Ryan in “When Harry Met Sally”

Diane Keaton’s glasses in Annie Hall are the best of all.

Diane Keaton in "Annie Hall"

Diane Keaton in “Annie Hall”

Too bad none of us looks like Meg Ryan or Diane Keaton.

I’ve been trying to find pictures of women writers with glasses. There aren’t many.  Here’s the Southern writer, Elizabeth Spencer.  She is usually photographed without glasses.

Elizabeth Spencer

Elizabeth Spencer

Here’s  Karen Thompson Walker, author of The Age of Miracles, a very good literary science fiction book.

Karen Thompson Walker with glasses

Karen Thompson Walker, author of The Age of Miracles

Here’s award-winning Barbara Kingsolver.  She is sometimes photographed with glasses:

Barbara Kingsolver

Barbara Kingsolver

Here’s Madeline Miller, author of The Song of Achilles and winner of the Orange Prize.

Madeline Miller

Madeline Miller

Dorothy Parker didn’t wear glasses in public.  “Men seldom make passes/At girls who wear glasses,” she wrote.

Dorothy Parker 01Who are your favorite women writers with glasses?

DOVER BOOKS.  I love book catalogues, and today we received the Dover Publications catalogue in the mail.

$5 off when you order $35 or more!

 The first six pages are devoted to Shakespeare.  (So cute!)  And since I’ve been thinking about reading Shakespeare this winter, I got out my Pelican edition.  I also have some little paperbacks that are easier to read.

Trollope’s Ralph the Heir is back in print.

What about The Riddle of the Sands?  (I have this, but my cat threw up on it.)

Cranford is $3.50.

But honestly I have my share of classics.

Still, I urge you to go to Dover.  Where would we be without them?