If you are over 40 as I am, you have begun to feel the effects of Father Time slowly bitch slapping you to death. I will probably make it beyond my allotted three score and ten if my vices don’t kill me first. Most people do these days. Some decline is to be expected though. As far as Mother Nature is concerned, my body is well past its warranty.

I’ve been nearsighted since I was in my late twenties and it is gradually getting worse. Not James Thurber worse, but worse nonetheless. Uncorrected, I used to have trouble reading street signs at night. Now I can barely make out that there is any writing on them, even in the middle of the day.

Farsightedness has become an increasing problem, which is to be expected as one gets older. I had hoped that my nearsightedness and farsightedness would cancel each other out, leaving me an eagle-eyed old goat. No such luck.

Without my glasses, anything beyond a distance of two feet is a blur. With the glasses on, the same holds true for objects less than three feet. As an empiricst, I must therefore conclude that anything between two and three feet of me does not actually exist. It is an extra-dimensional zone filled with vaguely humanoid blobs spouting mindless prattle and asking me what I’m staring at. I wish I could answer them, I really do.

Getting fitted with bifocals would solve this problem but I’m not about to do that. I feel old enough already.