Contact Lenses

Remember this contact lens story?

This week, my left contact starting bothering me AGAIN.  AT SCHOOL.  You know, when I need to see and work and teach and do things.

And I thought to myself shoot!  Did my eye doctor and I mix up the mixed up contact lenses and I’m wearing the new one when I’m supposed to be wearing the old one?  UGHHHHHH.

I popped out my left lens, put it in a case that I happened to have in my desk drawer, reached for the solution from my desk drawer, and realized I was out of solution.  

So I just poured water on it because I WAS TEACHING AND DOING HARD STUFF.  Also, water works just fine on hard contact lenses.

So I taught one-eyed and walked around one-eyed and I was a pirate again.  But I was too grumpy to do the whole ARRR thing so you know I was annoyed.

Well.

When I brought my kids back from recess, my RIGHT contact started bothering me.  So I rubbed my eye.  To itch it or whatever.

AND I LOST IT.

IT DISAPPEARED.

AND THEN I WAS BLIND BECAUSE I HAD ZERO CONTACTS IN AND I ALREADY TOLD YOU IN THAT OTHER POST THAT I AM AS BLIND AS A BAT.

My worst nightmare had come true.

Except instead of being at home, in bed with no contacts, while an earthquake happens in the middle of the night, and I can’t find my glasses because the earthquake shook them off the nightstand, and I AM BLIND . . .

I WAS AT SCHOOL WITH THIRTY STUDENTS WHO WERE DRINKING WATER FROM THE WATER FOUNTAIN AND NOT GOING TO THE CARPET WHILE I WAS BLIND.

{insert scary horror music here}

I quickly popped the LEFT one back in just so I could find the right one, but I couldn’t find the right one.  Anywhere.  Not even when one of my kiddos said why are you rubbing your hand back and forth over the carpet like that?

Um.

It wasn’t on my shirt or in my hair on the carpet or on my desk and then my right eye started to twitch a bit and then I knew.

MY RIGHT CONTACT WAS SOMEWHERE IN MY BRAIN.

Just floating around all lah – di- dah with not a care in the world, skip to my lou, nah, nah, nah, you can’t catch me.

I looked for it in the tiny mirror that I keep in my classroom for those times when I have an extra minute or two and want to see if my makeup is still applied to my face after I’ve rubbed it over and over again because my kids won’t stop talking, or when I’ve rubbed and rubbed it with alcohol because someone sneezed or coughed right in my face doing reading groups, but looking in a teeny, dirty, fogged up mirror for a contact that is nowhere IN YOUR ACTUAL EYE because it’s BACK BEHIND YOUR EYE IN THE NETHER REGIONS is pretty much futile.

I grabbed my partner teacher next door so she could watch my kids run amuck and ran to the staff bathroom near my classroom.

Still nothing.

No contact was visible but I COULD FEEL IT IN THERE SOMEWHERE.

I think ten instructional minutes had gone by at this point so I gave up.

I called my class to the carpet and I taught a math lesson.

I TAUGHT AN ENTIRE MATH LESSON WHILE I WAS ONE EYED AND WHILE A CONTACT WAS JUST FLOATING AROUND IN MY BRAIN.

Now that needs to be printed on one of those teaching t-shirts.  I’d wear THAT.

I can see it now:

I TEACH MATH ONE-EYED WHILE A CONTACT LENS FLOATS IN MY BRAIN.  WHAT DO YOU DO ALL DAY?

Once I finally got my kids to their seats to work independently, I went back to my teeny mirror and tried AGAIN.

And I saw it!!

So I pushed it a little to get it back onto my eye or at least out of my eye, and quick as a wink, it laughed at me and disappeared again.

YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME, I said.

To which one of my kids said, what?

I gave up again.

Once I walked my kids to lunch, hopefully in a straight line, who knows, I couldn’t see that well, I calmed myself down and prayed.

I took a deep breath and tried again while not in a hurry and with zero people in the room.

And I got it.

And I rinsed it with water and it was fine the rest of the day.

That was when I decided I needed caffeine and ever since I started drinking coffee again, my contacts have been a-okay.

🙂

Oh, and also, I’m wearing a new pair of contacts.

But I think that’s just a coincidence.

😉

PS  Yes, this really happened, and I’m not exaggerating any of it.  For real.  This is my life.  Hello.  Welcome.