How Suburban Street-Cred Ruined My Eyesight and Other Spooky Tales
I like to say that I had perfect eyesight until my sophomore year of high-school, when reading the fine print in my AP World History textbook for three hours a night obliterated my pristine 20/20. The truth is that the deterioration of my vision began much earlier, perhaps as early as the fourth grade. Coincidentally, the fourth grade was also the fateful year that I walked into a Hair Cuttery, asked for some layers in my blunt, shoulder-length hair and walked out with my soul torn asunder and a haircut best compared to the “Hillary Clinton Helmet.” Neither a hard-ball politician nor physically developed enough to look like a girl beneath the blonde Beatles mop, the haircut destroyed whatever self-esteem I had amassed over my 11 short years. I immediately took to wearing a Che Guevara-style black beret during all waking hours, a boon which my teachers granted me, no questions asked, even though it was against my elementary school dress code.
I’ve always been a rather performative person, a lover of jokes and raunchy story-telling. After my haircut, however, I found my comedic powers greatly diminished by my newfound insecurity. Since I was still very much interested in seeming “cool,” I decided to traverse a different avenue to notoriety, one that was based more in grit and determination than in personality. I constructed my own brand of infamy by participating in a ritualistic competition known as, “how long can you touch your eyeball with your bare finger?” In a school-wide contest, she who could finger her bare ball for the longest amount of time without breaking face or contact was unanimously awarded immortal celebrity and the respect of her peers.
Again and again, I placed the pad of my grimy fourth-grade finger on my exposed eyeball to the delight and horror of my cohort. I don’t particularly remember if I was the sovereign eyeball-toucher or not. What I do know is that, at the age of twenty-two, the surfaces of both of my corneas are covered, I repeat covered, with a menagerie of floaters. For those of you who don’t know what a floater is, let me inform you: a floater is the microscopic exoskeleton of dead bacteria that lingers on the surface of your eye forever. I have a few that are so large, I sometimes mistake them for birds when I stare into a clear blue sky. I often play games of Tetris using only my own floaters and a blank stretch of wall. I convince myself that there’s a miniscule grey smear on my computer screen, only to find that it follows me wherever I go. One floater in particular (on my right eye — I’m right handed) dominates my sightscape with such magnanimous reach and fluidity that I have come to refer to it as the Bald Eagle.
I suppose I’m not really as penitent as I should be. In a way, I feel as though my floaters make me worldly. I’ve seen stuff. I’ve touched the stuff that does the seeing. Strictly speaking, they are not my enemies. Striving for suburban street cred has always carried me through the turbulent crises of my life.
For instance, at the age of seven, I found myself trying to establish my aesthetic voice, so to speak. I knew I had struck gold when, at a single garage sale, I obtained a.) one pair of sequined pink gauchos, and b.) a plastic toy guitar with the WWE logo emblazoned on its shiny black exterior. The power of these items resounded deeply in my tender body and I immediately sensed that, when combined, they would bestow me with an unstoppable aesthetic appeal that could be used to ensnare the elusive affections of my older neighborhood crush, the teenage Matt Holt.
Donning my Liberace gauchos and slinging my six-string over my back, I waited at the bottom of my driveway for Matt to arrive home from high-school. As I watched his spindly figure disembark from the bus a street down, I prepared myself for transcendence. From the three plastic keys on the guitar’s thin neck, I selected the key that, when pressed, played The Undertaker’s WWE theme music. The Undertaker is a pro wrestler who looks like bad-batch amphetamine Kid Rock and his trademark gimmick is his ability to roll his eyes so far back into his head that they begin to look surreal, like a pair of jaundiced boiled eggs. True to his character, his theme music is a punishing, distorted riff that puts one in mind of basement-dwelling step brothers who reek of hydroponic and sell illegal species of snakes on Craig’s List. Potent stuff, to be sure.
As the Undertaker theme wailed from my axe, I began to chant the single lyric I had composed to accompany it. If I remember correctly, the lyric was as follows: “Death is imminent,” imminent being a word I had pilfered from my weekly spelling test. No doubt, Matt Holt was taken aback by the power of my display, though he guarded his emotions well. Ultimately, my quest for love was an impossible one, but I was emboldened by my own gumption and ability to perform with reckless abandon. I often wish I could harness the same desire for artistic truth and affirmation now that I am an adult.
I’m resisting the urge to finish with an over-sentimental conclusion, so perhaps I’ll just say this: at this very moment, a sizeable grey dot is floating around the white page of this word document. I am convincing myself that I can see the actual flagellum on this dead bacterium. I am content in and grateful to my neurosis.
