I recently had an eyesight exam, and I had pretty decent results! My prescription barely changed, but I will be getting new frames, since I kinda wanted a bit of a change on my face, I guess.
Due to this, I thought it would be fun to share a little bit about every pair of glasses Iâve had in my life!
I couldnât find good pictures of any of these glasses, so I decided to represent them using pixel art, just to have some visuals for this post.
I still remember when I finally got my first pair of glasses, I was 10 or 11 years old, maybe, I was just getting started on my 4th grade of primary school, and getting a desk that was further away from the whiteboardâmaybe it was still a chalkboard, canât recallâor maybe my eyesight was just decaying naturally as I grew old. Not sure.
For quite some time, my parents didnât believe I actually needed glasses. I was the kind of kid who just wanted to have new shiny things, so they probably thought I wanted to look smart and that my eyesight was actually just fine.
Turns out, I had myopia! Short-sightedness. I could see fantastically from up close, but everything turned blurry when I looked at something far away. So, my parents decided to take me for a vision exam.
~2011
I changed glasses in the same eye clinic for the first three times, it became a pretty common place because we were friends with the doctor there. I remember the place very vividly, first it was me, then me and one of my siblings, and eventually all of us, who would get our tests done, and we always had to wait some time in the reception room.
We would play around with some toys there. All of them were didactic ones, for kids in kinder garden, but even a grown-up kid like me could find some fun with those colored wire mazes, moving beads of different shapes from one end to the other.
There were also some magazines, and newspapers. I never forgot the name of one, AlgarabĂa, a beaufiful word in Spanish I must sayâwhich means âcommotionâ or âshoutingâ, but with a distinct elegance to itâwithout a true equal in English, in my humble opinion. It was a magazine filled with a variety of articles about culture, news and opinion pieces. I remember reading some of it, but I canât recall any specifics. I do remember liking the cover artwork, which wrapped around the back and front of the magazine. During all the visits I did, there was always an issue of these to flip through.
My first glasses were silver-colored and oval-shaped, I donât really remember why I went for such a weird choice but alas, I wasâand still amâweird. Going with that style inevitably ended with comparisons to Harry Potter and nerdy-ness in general at school, but I didnât mind and wore them up until middle school.
~2016
Eventually, I think my head turned too big for them, or I simply had to do another vision test. I got the chance to update the frames too, and I somehow got a pretty neat pair of Ray-Ban, that I also really liked for quite a while.
A year or two into high school, I got hit in the face with a basketball, and well, one of the legs broke. Donât worry, it didnât hurt that much, I was already used to getting hit in the face as a goalkeeper in middle school.
I remember all trying to fix it in a couple of different ways, most of them were using a mix of crazy glue with sodium, since my mother said that would turn the glue into a stronger plastic compound. It was actually pretty cool, and worked well, until it broke off again after a few months, maybe in just weeks, I canât recall.
As an aside, a thing I love about Mexico, is that a lot of stuff that would cost hundreds of dollars in the US or Europe, is actually an everyday thing here. Right to repair thrives, from washing machines to furniture upholstery, small workshops where that gets done are pretty affordable overall.
My dad found a glasses repair shop, and got that leg fixed in place for 3 bucks, and off we went for another while.
Unfortunately, I felt a bit annoyed by the slight imperfection in my glasses. The fix worked fine, but the leg had a small bump, it was fixed by a staple welded in place, and the resin was slightly melted around it, it wasnât a smooth finish, and I guess I just got bothered by the aesthetic, even if it was functional.
~2018
At some point I was given another metallic frame for oval-shaped lenses. It definitely looked like it was made for grandpas. It was gold colored and the legs had wood-textured temple tips. Honestly, I kinda liked how quirky they were, I got the lenses on my Ray-Bans and got them cut to fit on this one, so I could use them in case of an emergency. This means I didnât go to an eye clinic and got a new eyesight check at the time, so, while they could work, it wouldnât be ideal.
I eventually went to the eye clinic again, and had another chance to update my frames, and didnât get to use these very much, for nowâŚ
~2019
My new glasses were from some other brand I canât quite remember, I want to think they were cheaper, canât confirm. I remember them because the resin had a matte finish, they were dark blue on the top bar and bridge, and frosted/transparent on the rimsâyes, I had to look up the part names for these things.
I really liked these new ones, and I wore them all the way to University, actually. I liked the look, I loved the feeling and I then stopped liking them.
Honestly, I should have seen this coming. The clear plastic always ends up yellowing, especially when in constant contact with my nose and stuff. Also, the finish in the plastic ended up peeling off overtime, maybe itâs just my skin, but it was probably just the constant exposure to sunlight, and, the environment? I guess?
Finally, one of the rims broke, and since itâs a rim, it could not be welded back into place as easily, I remember the technician telling me it was way too thin for it too last, so I only used it for a little while like that.
As the plastic kept getting worse and no good fix could be made, I ended up going back to my golden colored glasses for a while. Until a friend of the family decided to gift me and my siblings a new pair for each of us.
2022
So, this was the first prescription that I didnât get in that one eye clinic that I had gone to since my childhood. We went to Costco instead.
I liked the gold grandpa glasses, but I still wanted a change of style, I was definitely not buy anything plastic or transparent this time, so I picked these from the available options.
These are the glasses represented in my profile picture, I just loved the dark blue color of them. Iâm still wearing today, and I quite like them. The brand is Bulova, which is actually a watch brand. I donât really have any loyalty to it, but the new ones I will get turned out to be Bulova too, so I guess I just like the minimalist designs they make.
