New Glasses

Selecting a new pair of glasses is probably the most difficult task any individual faces. It's not like buying a shirt, which can be impulsive, or buying music, which springs out of a hobby or interest. Glasses, if you're so burdened to require them, are an accessory that is probably more vital than anything to how you are perceived by the world.

Going along with my trait of indecisiveness and guarded action, I had quite the time attempting to pick out new glasses in the last week or so since my old ones finally succumbed.

I have to say, it was bittersweet when they broke. I mean, these are items that I've had on my face for the better part of 3 years or so. When I look back at photos of myself in my college glory years, be it traveling Europe or playing trombone or whatever, I'm wearing those glasses. That's saying something, you know? But it was time to execute some sort of change anyways. The lacquer was starting to wear off, which isn't quite as desirable on glasses as it is on trombones. Mellower sound, you know?

Far more than any other accessory, glasses need to say something fundamental about who you are as a person. As such, any potential glasses-buyer needs to walk into the vision store with some set of requirements to be fulfilled. A list, if you will, of things the glasses need to say about your persona. Or at least, how you want your persona to be outwardly projected.

My list, you ask?

1- I listen to lots of jazz
2- I listen to lots of other music too
3- Slightly pretentious/sophisticated
4- Grounded in reality
5- Normal
6- Individual
7- Of course I'll take you (insert beautiful woman here) to the concert
8- Dammit, I'm socially incompetent, but try to ignore that

As you can clearly see, buying glasses is an exercise in contradiction. Because people are inherently contradictions, at least the people I know. You think they feel one way, and then it turns out completely the opposite. Whilst you remain supremely oblivious.

So basically you want your glasses to showcase different and conflicting sides of your personality, while still unifying those different sides under some common theory. Maybe it's an exercise in futility, like Einstein trying to find a single unifying theory to nature. But I can go through my realistic life without knowing a unifying theory to nature. The same cannot be said for glasses that make me look like a douchebag. And if you take a look at people around you, I think there are many people who could have spared a little more time and thought process into the purchasing of glasses.

Anyways, to tie this up, the glasses I showcased here last week are alas, not to be mine for much longer. Through the fortuitous blend of ill fit and the voice of God booming from burning bush in the middle of Pearle Vision, I upgraded my new glasses to rimless frames. Rectangular ones. The sort of pair I used to drool on while browsing the eyeglass stores in Nottingham. And yes, that most assuredly played a role. Glasses just wouldn't fit on me if they didn't contain some sort of half pained yet still real memory of a far off home. Anyways, they had to be sent away to be made, I'll attempt to post photos once they show up again. Maybe the internet void can match them against my list.