Open Your Eyes

I recently had to have my pupils dilated for a test with the eye doctor. It is a relatively simple process; they put some drops in your eyes, you wait 20 – 30 minutes and then your pupils are dilated enough that they can take snapshots of the back of your eyes so they can see all the blood vessels and veins and such. While it doesn’t hurt, it was a little uncomfortable for me because…well, your pupils aren’t supposed to let in that much light.

While this was going on it got the wheels turning in my brain and I was thinking about how cool it would be if there were some drops you could put in your eyes and you would see things more clearly. Not just more light would be let in, but everything would be seen like it was in HD. Imagine the possibilities:

·     If you misplaced something, you’d be able to see it quicker. No more lost keys, cell phones, or kids.

·     When you went shopping and tried on that outfit you “just have to get”, you would see that although it looks great on other people, it just doesn’t look so good on you.

·     When your kids came to ask for something, you’d know right away if they were up to something. You’d see it in their eyes.

·     When you asked your kids a question about a test at school, or if they had any homework, they wouldn’t be able to lie. Again, you’d see it in their eyes.

·     When you got lost driving and didn’t have a GPS, you’d clearly see the way you needed to go to get back on track.

·     Before you put any junk food into your mouth, you’d see what it was going to do to you – both now and in the future.

·     You would be able to see what is important in life.

That would be awesome, wouldn’t it? Or would it? I started thinking some more and realized that in addition to seeing all those things, you’d see a lot of other things, too, because those drops would allow you to see much clearer than you do now, such as:

·     When you asked someone how they’re doing and they said they were doing fine, you’d see that they’re actually not doing very well and maybe even in a lot of pain.

·     You would also see that many people that have a big smile on their face are actually crying on the inside.

·     You would see that some people that seem to have it all together are hiding something that would tear their world apart if it ever got out.

·     You wouldn’t be able to fool yourself any more and you’d see that maybe your own life wasn’t what it was cracked up to be.

·     You would be able to see that some of the things you thought were so important in life really aren’t important at all.

I like to think that I have good insight into people, but I definitely don’t pick up on a lot of things. I’m not sure I’d really, truly like to see everybody exactly as they are and everything exactly as it is – the good, the bad and the ugly. I wouldn’t mind the good, but I’m not sure I’d want to see the bad and the ugly, especially in myself. As with the amount of light being let in by my pupils in the dilation test, I don’t think I could handle that much.

Did It Really Happen?

A couple people have asked me if some of the things I write about really happened or was it really like that growing up. And another person asked me how the heck I remember all this stuff. OK, you got me. I’m really an only child from a wealthy family and every story is made up. I don’t really have six brothers and two sisters, and there were never card games and board games; I didn’t have to learn to get along with others, or how to share things, or how to wait for things; I got everything and anything I wanted, especially at Christmas; my yard was not the football field or the wiffle ball field where we played for hours; I went on luxurious vacations every year; I didn’t have to count out M&M’s in a Dixie Cup. Well, maybe in some parallel universe or imaginary world that is true, but not here in the real world. All I can say is, I write things as I remember them. Does that mean that everything I write is exactly how it happened? Probably not, but what I write is how I remember things and so far no one has come forward and said, “That never happened.”, or “This is what really happened.”, or “This is how that really happened.”.

I know I have a pretty good memory because there are times I bring up situations and someone doesn’t remember it, but as I fill in the details they’ll say, “Oh, yeah. I remember that!” Then we’ll talk about it for fifteen or twenty minutes and laugh about things that happened. Oftentimes it will lead to the retelling of other situations that happened, some even funnier than the original one we talked about. I don’t know why I have such clear memories of occurrences from decades ago – but can’t remember where I left my cell phone ten minutes ago – but maybe it’s because those were some great times and I drank in all the details.

I try not to make it sound like everything was wonderful when I was a kid, because it wasn’t. We weren’t The Brady Bunch or the Huxtables on The Cosby Show. My family went through some hard times, especially trying to feed, clothe and provide for nine kids. I could focus on the struggles I had as a kid, or that we had as a family, but as I look back on my childhood I don’t see the tough times as much as I see how those times taught me something about life, myself or family. In many instances, those tough times taught me what was really important as opposed to what just seemed to be important. That doesn’t mean I always made the right decisions, I made enough bad ones in my life to last ten lifetimes, but I’d like to think that I learned from my mistakes and grew and changed because of them.

My parents and family were by no means perfect. However, my parents raised nine kids, all who are reasonably successful adults. Not one of us is a criminal or a derelict. Trust me when I say that there were other families we knew that had as many, or almost as many, kids as we did and that cannot be said about them. I’m not bragging or trying to put anyone down, but it would have been easy for any of us to turn to a different lifestyle than we did in order to get the “things” many of our friends had. That we didn’t is a testament to our parents and how they taught us to live.

So did this stuff really happen and was it really like I say it was? As far as I remember, yes and yes. I remember it from my perspective and through the lenses of 30 – 40 year old glasses. Things may be a little fuzzy around the edges, but the main part is very clear. I had parents who loved me, and brothers and sisters that I loved (well most of the time anyway). As my Dad used to frequently say, we always had “a roof over our heads, food on the table and clothes on our backs”, despite some fairly hard times. It’s not all flowers and rainbows today either, but I often think that if my parents got through challenges with nine kids, I can do it with two.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.