A TALE OF WOE

This is a story of a man named Nippy

Who lost most all the marbles in his head.

And his wife whose name was Frances

The two of them were happy they were wed.

They have a son, his name is Marty.

"You two are getting senile," is what he said.

This story's truthful, embarrassingly truthful-ish

Every word that is about to be read.

It was halloween eve, the kids were home from school and it was too early for trick or treating.  Picture the scene:  Rain.  Thunder in the distance.  Lights out.  Candles flickering from all the chaos.  The jack-o-lanterns sitting forlornly on the porch were drenched in water.  Two hyper boys were bouncing off the walls having already discovered the candy that was set aside in case anyone stopped by in costumes.  The dog, Gumbo, thinking it was great fun was happily chasing them and twirling in circles, barking madly.  One could almost hear Boris Karloff madly playing the distinctive, forceful theme from Phantom of the Opera in the background.

I was sitting next to Frances on the sofa and sensed trouble brewing so I removed my glasses.  My $800.00 progressive lens glasses with prisms both horizontally and vertically.  The ones my ophthalmologist said were a unique case.  The ones he worked hard to assure I no longer had to suffer with double vision.  Frances had just removed hers as well. 

It happened.  Boy number one was on my back, his hand around my face covering my eyes. There was a clap of thunder as I handed my glasses to Frances assuming she'd removed them somewhere safe.  The boy and I went to the floor, laughing as we wrestled with Gumbo on top. Boy number two joined in.  That's when the trouble started. 
Their mother finally said the game was over, raincoats were put over costumes and the family left for a wet evening of candy gathering.  Frances and I retrieved the glasses. 

Horrors!!! 

Mine were bent way out of shape.  I couldn't see at all.  Extreme double vision set in.  I was heartbroken.  Here we were in a foreign land and my glasses were horribly bent.  It was too late to do anything that night so I stumbled and bumped into things as I greeted the trick or treaters.  I tried to correct what I could on the frames but only managed to be able to get them where I could continue reading out of the corner of one side as long as I held the other eye shut. 

Frances tried hers on.  She too couldn't see well out of hers.  Her reading glasses had been damaged by the boys as well.  What were we going to do?  We needed to find the solution to my sight.  Frances could just go buy another pair of reading glasses.  I couldn't.  Meanwhile I continued greeting drenching wet costumed kids, dropping candy on the ground thinking I was hitting their extended sacks as I bumped into the door frame.  I can understand why they so quickly ran away looking back over their shoulders.

We prayed that the Lord would help us find a solution.  We did not want to blame the boys, we certainly didn't want them to think they were at fault.  I was the one who should have been more careful.  I went to bed with a patch over one eye so I could continue to try to see enough to read my book I so wanted to finish.

The next morning, Frances called every eye institute we could find in this foreign land explaining my problem.  We couldn't find anyone who could deal with my unique situation.  We didn't find what we needed concerning someone to help with the prisms.  We went to one place to, at least, get the frames back in shape and tightened.  The lady tried.  It just became worse.  She asked lots of questions.  She had trouble seeing the progressive lens but eventually did say she did.  She suggested we call our old eye doctor and get records sent here.  She tried to be cheerful and I prayed for her.  We returned home  but first called our doctor in Louisiana.  They retrieved my records and planned to order a new set of frames and have them mailed to us but did say it was best if they put the lens in themselves .  We started to pack our bags, thinking who we could call to put us up for the night.  First, they asked us to read out the information on the side of the glasses so they could order the correct frames  The glass case said I had the correct frames but we couldn't seem to read the numbers for the lady.  Marty was called in.  He read the numbers.

  They were not they numbers they were supposed to be.  

He looked at Frances glasses.  "Hay," he said, "these two look a lot alike."  He read the numbers on Frances'.  She had mine and I hers. 
So stress over losing something as valuable as your sight can do strange things to the mind.  Neither one of us could think clearly.  We spent a night of agony and a day of searching for help in this western land only to discover the solution was right under our noses. Ha.
What bothers me most is that the lady who tried to make mine work said she had 27 years experience and she couldn't tell there weren't prisms in them or that they weren't progressive. 
We have been laughing all afternoon about the miracle of God helping us find my sight. 

 Marty said we moved over here just in time since both of our minds were slowly disappearing.

So that's our tale of woe.

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