Adventures in Laziness (with a moral)

I wore prescription glasses from the time I was two until I was thirteen, when my eyes were declared cured. This run of good eyesight lasted about fifteen years (and dovetailed nicely with The Vain Years: Dating and Early Marriage). By the time my opthamologist told me my run of luck had run out, I really didn't care so much about having to wear glasses.

I did have half-hearted fling with contacts, but my astigmatism made them feel exactly like wearing little slivers of glass in each eye.

My eyes, one of which is staunchly nearsighted while the other is perversely farsighted, have now deteriorated to the point where I have to shell out for prescription sunglasses, too.

Prescription sunglasses which I wear every day when I pick up Bug from school. You see, Bug's school has a policy where parents picking up children have to come into the school lobby to get their kids. It's a good policy, and I support it, but it does get a little tiresome having to find a parking spot and go into the lobby to retrieve her every day. And rather than carry my glasses case with me and switch out glasses for the thirty seconds I'm inside the school, I just shove my sunglasses to the top of my head when I walk in, scan quickly for the familiar outline of my kid, take her and leave.

Last Wednesday, I walked into the school lobby to pick up Bug and a friend. I saw Bug standing with her back to me looking up the main staircase, likely waiting for the friend to come down. I patted her head and tugged her ponytail lightly and said, "Hi, honey!" Then I stood with my hand on her shoulder and waited for the friend to come down the stairs.

Out of my peripheral vision, I could tell Bug was continuing to look up at me and not the stairs. Looking down at her, I saw that ... OH CRAP. This kid was not Bug at all. I removed my hand from the shoulder of the kid who was not Bug, but who was (in my defense) dressed in exactly the same bright green hoodie and navy capri sweatpants as Bug was wearing that day, not to mention being brown of hair and the same basic height.

"Heh, heh," I said, "I thought you were my kid." She gave me the weak smile you give the mentally unstable when you don't want to upset them. I took two non-threatening steps away to show that I was not the person they warn you about in the Stranger Danger talk.

Luckily for me, Bug came down the stairs right then, and I was able to show the Kid Who Was Not Bug that they were dressed exactly the same. And, wow, WASN'T THAT FUNNY! NOT WEIRD-FUNNY, BUT FUNNY-HA-HA?? Then I dragged Bug and her friend very quickly out of the building.

Moral: There's a reason why you wear prescription glasses, you dumbass.