See the universe in a grain of sand...

Food vendor outside the MET

‎This week, in an effort to raise the brooklynity of our appearance, Marion and I got new glasses.

If you belong to that selected and illustrious class of people with visual impairments, you know that this can be a harrowing experience. I hadn't changed them in more than 6 years, and it was a long due obligation. As a result, I now see a ludicrous amount of things in the world, from the leaves in the trees to the faces on people at the end of the street. All in crisp, detailed and contrasted colours. 

Midtown, Broadway and 50th Street

Needless to say it is disorienting, and I find myself stumbling and missing my step with worrying frequency. Looking down I am mesmerised by the structure of the concrete I thread on, and I am hardly able to judge the distance between me (localised – as Marion would probably have excellent arguments to prove – between my eyes) and the tip of my feet. And while I know that this sensation is going to pass, for now I am fascinated by this new type of perception.

Amusingly, this experience also seems to render me attentive to other forms of sensory input, such as the small hums and sounds that pervade the city environment, the smell of food stalls wafting over from the other side of the street, or the harmonics of the soul a cappella group walking, singing and clapping through the subway train. So, while I wait for my brain to readjust my sight to its proper volume, I will observe, look, absorb the world around me with all the more wonder and fascination.