Surprise Contact

I stood on the tiny platform last evening waiting for the train to take me to New York. My Goddaughter texted with reckless abandon on her lime green cell phone while my uncle spoke about a frustrating job search. On the tip of my left index finger, I held a drying contact lens.

The story begins the previous Wednesday evening in my bathroom of many vanities. I was already late for my meeting with Justin, a young man I hadn't seen since I had been in the seminary some eight years prior. I stood like a statue in that bathroom because the right contact I had attempted to put in my eye caromed first off my eyelash and then off the side of my reflexive left hand. It fell into oblivion, completely transparent against whichever surface on which it had landed. After combing the bath mat and running my hand across both the sink and tile, I decided on a course of action. I leapt onto the hardwood floor in the hallway and grabbed the flashlight with the hope that reflection might offer some clue as to its whereabouts. The search continued for at least 10 minutes during which time I sullied my recently showered self by crawling across the bathroom floor. After those ten minutes, I admitted defeat and grabbed my glasses.

I dressed and reentered the bathroom to brush my teeth. There on one of the many vanities the listless contact rested, weary from its battle with my lashes. I cleaned it, despectacled myself, and quickly set the contacts in my eyes.

At the conclusion of that enjoyable evening, I returned to the apartment and - at least I thought - removed both contacts, cleaned them, and placed them delicately and deliberately in their respective carriers. Soon after, as a result of both my sleepiness and a couple excellent tequila drinks I had imbibed earlier, I fell fast asleep.

Fast forward to yesterday, Saturday, October 2nd. I had the opportunity to spend my actual birthday with my family for the first time in 8 years. They bought for me tickets to attend the UCONN - Vanderbilt game, which UCONN proceeded to win in convincing fashion. Sometime just before the second quarter, I rubbed my eye lightly and noticed it went blurry. A result of the beer I had drunk while tailgating coupled with being tired, I decided. And I thought nothing more of it for the remainder of that day - though I thought the persistance of the blurriness, as well as the resultant migraine, odd...

Until I removed the not-so-moist contact and stood on the tiny platform with it clinging to my index finger.

As the train arrived at the tiny station, I wondered how to store the contact. I considered placing it in the three quarters full water bottle my aunt had sent with me on my return trip. But that seemed inadequate and risky. I considered holding it the entire ride back to the city, but I figured it would, given time, simply drop into the disgusting void that is the floor of a MetroNorth train. I took my seat aboard the train with no good solution. Being tired and out of ideas, I inserted the contact into one of the pockets of my wallet, understanding full well that I was destroying the only left contact I had.

The doctor had given me two left contacts to try, along with a right one. He had explained that the contact in the left eye had a weight that adjusted to my eye to address that eye's astigmatism. And it wasn't an exact science to design a contact for an eye with astigmatism. The problem was I had already lost that other contact, which meant that the one in my wallet was the last left contact I had until I could return to the optometrist.

I slept most of the way back and arrived at the apartment late that night. I unpacked and started recharging the myriad technical devices in my care. Only when I extracted my wallet from my jeans did I remember that a sad contact sat within its confines. I pulled the hard and creased disc from the wallet, and I somberly carried it in my outstretched left hand to the bathroom of many vanities where I would attempt - though most assuredly fail - to resurrect it with the Opti-Free Contact Cleanser. I opened the right side of the contact case to see a contact floating therein. I then unscrewed the left side expecting to see the ripple of clear liquid. And I did. Except that I saw a contact listing in the ripples. So, that meant I had removed the contacts I had worn that previous Wednesday night.

That's when I realized the story had actually begun on September 15th. I sat in a small room in Seattle, the night before I was to travel east. I had just spoken to my grandfather, who had reluctantly informed me that Buddy, my dog, had run away nearly 36 hours earlier. I sat at the small desk, shell-shocked by the news. I hadn't noticed the tears until they had moistened my goatee. Being the pragmatist I am, I had suddenly realized that such emotional catharsis could put my contacts at risk. Normally, I wouldn't have been wearing my contacts, but I had just had a follow-up appointment with my optometrist to check on the efficacy of the contact lenses. So, I retrieved the lens case and extracted the right lens. I then pulled at my left eye. The tears continued to flow as I tried, in vain, to pluck the lens from my eye. At a certain point, I realized that the left eye had lost focus. But the lens was not on my finger. After an unsuccessful search, I had concluded that the lens was lost...

Until that moment when I stared with bewilderment at the contact in the left side of the contact lens holder.