Friday 29 March 2013

My Emergency Reading Glasses


    Even after more than a decade of needing them to read, I am still constantly going off and forgetting to take my glasses with me.  My distant vision is still very good, like the old joke says, “my eyes are fine, but my arms are too short”.  Yep, its the close up stuff that I can’t see.  Fortunately, I don’t need prescription glasses, just normal everyday reading glasses off of the shelf.
    Of course, reading glasses don’t do me a whole lot of good, if I go off and forget to bring them with me.  Luckily, I have discovered a trick that can be used to read in an emergency.  Here’s what I do:
I take my hand and make a tiny little hole using my index finger.  This I put over the text I want to read, and then I lower an eye to the finger.  Looking through the small hole allows me to read.
    This is how I understand it.  As we grow older, the eye loses strength, to the point where it can no longer adjust to focusing on close-up items.  Making the tiny hole with your finger, in effect does the same thing as creating another pupil for your eye, and it allows the image in the hole to reflect, in focus, on the retina in the back of your eye.
    People often kid me when I do my finger trick to read, but it works, and I like to think that it might be a good thing to know in an emergency.  It works so well I thought I would take out a patent on it, but I will give it out to you for free.  Give it a try.

To read my older blogs or to view my paintings, go to: www.davidmarchant.ca


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