To the Optometrist's Eye Chart

I have to pretend I don’t know it by heart, that I haven’t been in the chair reading that chart so many times before. She turns the lights off, turns the machine on and we begin.

I’ve done this since I was two. The doctor had a little animatronic dog that would give a cheery yip if I got one right.

They must teach them in optometry school how to move the wand they use to cover your eye; they all flick it away when I’m done reading. I’ve not had one yet that doesn’t remind me of a hummingbird flitting around the dark room.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/
commons/9/9f/Snellen_chart.svg

I wish she would let me start at the top, the big bold E is clear as day and very confidence building. No, I always start 2 or 3 lines down. She tests one eye and then the next. The “T” could be an “E;” the last one is a number. A 5? It looks like an “S”. But then it looks like a 4.

She pulls the lens machine in front of me, sorting and adding different lenses and then asks me to read them again. She flips a lever and the lens changes, “Is it better here?” then flip, “...or here?”

Eventually, she narrows it down so that I can’t tell the difference, though I want to. “Is this better [flip]...or this?” I strain to see which is more focused, which one makes the lines on the “E” cleaner, the curve of the “C” smoother. “Go back,” I say.

“Here…[flip]...or here?”

I stare and study the chart, my eyes are so working hard that I can feel the muscles tighten. The chart comes in and out of focus just barely, almost imperceptibly. I squint, like I’m looking three minutes into the future.