A recent trip to Mount Shasta became more memorable due to me losing my glasses. When the optician asked me if I wanted the sunlight coating, I said yes. Well ! when someone sounds as though she’s offering the best thing in the world, you’ve got no option but to have it. Moreover insurance covered it (Insurance ! The secret American Ace). Just think of having a pair of glasses that turns black when you walk outside in sunlight and turns plain inside. Great ! I ordered one and the moment I started wearing, I didn’t like them. It looked as though I was wearing sun glasses all day.
But suddenly every day was a pleasant day. Be it sunny or cloudy, the day looked the same. Set me thinking.. Why do some people always see goodness ? Because they wear sunglasses in their minds. When they look into the world, they don’t see the scorching intense heat but pleasant evening. Always.
Reminds me of a duMaurier short story that I’d read sometime back - ‘The Blue Lenses’. The book which contains this story has another story you might’ve heard about – Birds. Yup. That famous Hitchcock movie was based on this. Coming back, Imagine ! You suddenly turn into a person to whom the only thing that is obvious about other people are their bad attributes. You look at them and you see them as .. animals. They talk to you and you cant talk may be because of hatred or may be dread. That’s exactly what happens in “The blue lenses”. The main protagonist undergoes an eye operation where she is made to put on a pair of blue lenses before the actual lenses. She begins to see everyone strangely – all humans with animal heads and human bodies. One nurse has kitten’s head, the doc is a terrier, sis nancy is a snake. First she thinks it is a joke but she realizes it is not. She mentions this and gets varied responses. Mostly others are offended. If you perceive something/someone as bad, should you tell them ? Is it because they’ve suddenly metamorphosed into something bad or your outlook has changed ?
Header Image - “Morning Calmness - San Francisco bay bridge” by David Yu via Flickr.