Laurie Coburn and I were only 6 months apart in age, and were in the same grade from kindergarten all through high school.
Because Laurie lived in my neighborhood I hung around with Laurie, both at school and after school, and was friends with her during the first few years of our time in school together. As Laurie reached the age of puberty she no longer wanted to play with boys, and by then it wasn’t cool to have a girl as a close friend. So Laurie and I drifted apart by around 5th grade.
Around this time Laurie was one of the first girls in my class to need glasses. I don’t recall that this had any bearing on the fact that we were no longer close friends, however Laurie since has told me that I did tease her about her having to wear glasses. I suppose I did, but I have no recollection of this.
I think I remember Laurie having to get new glasses in grade 6. She had worn her glasses full time ever since the first day she showed up at school wearing them. Knowing absolutely nothing about glasses didn’t make me a very good judge of how strong they were. But I seem to remember Laurie showing up with a new pair that year that looked stronger than her first pair.
For grades 7, 8 and 9 Laurie and I were in Junior high, and we were no longer in the same classroom. I really didn’t pay much attention to Laurie, even though she was probably the prettiest girl in the school. I had no interest in girls at that time, and in actual fact was a little tongue tied when I had to attempt to converse with a girl. I suppose if I had been a little more observant – or even a little more interested I might have noticed that by the time she was 14 the lenses in Laurie’s glasses looked fairly strong, and were thicker than the glasses that any of the other girls were wearing. Somehow I missed this, although I doubt that it would have made any difference to my non existent friendship with Laurie. She barely acknowledged me when we met each other in the halls.
When we went on to Senior high for grade 10 I noticed that Laurie no longer wore glasses. I didn’t know anything about things like contact lenses back then, so I just figured that her eyes got better and she didn’t have to wear glasses anymore. I know it wasn’t just the fact that she no longer wore glasses that made Laurie one of the most popular girls in our high school, as she was a very pretty and quite outgoing girl.
I think it was sometime during my year in grade 10 that I started my feeble attempts to attend the school dances and ask girls to dance. I didn’t do too badly, because somehow or another I had figured out that I was wasting my time pining after any of the really hot girls and I settled on dancing with the girls that were not in high demand. I suppose that is how I ended up going out with Marie. All the guys called her “Skinny Minnie”, because at that time she was flat as a pancake, skinny as a rail, and wore really short mini skirts. She also wore what appeared to me to be very thick glasses. Her glasses were completely flat on the front, and the lenses stuck out way behind the back of the rims of her plastic frames. They looked to be well over half an inch thick. And when I looked at Marie from head on the sides of her face were shrunken in by the lenses of her glasses. But Marie was a good dancer, a nice person, and was a lot of fun. I had just gotten my driver’s license, and Marie showed me what life was all about in the back seat of my dad’s car.
I went out with Marie for the next couple of years. She was still fairly thin, but she had filled out a little in the chest department and by the time we went to our grade 12 graduation dance the lenses in her glasses had gotten even thicker. Although she didn’t really hang around in her crowd Marie knew Laurie and knew that I had been friends with her in grade school. After Marie had gotten her newest glasses with the thicker lenses I had made a comment about them, and Marie told me that her glasses were not as thick as Laurie’s were. I was a little flabbergasted. By now I knew about contact lenses so I quickly recovered my composure and commented that I guessed that Laurie wore contact lenses. Marie confirmed that she did, and that her eyes were really bad now.
Marie and I went our separate ways after high school graduation. I went on to university and Marie became a dental technician. Before I graduated I heard from friends that Marie had married the dentist that she started working for after graduation. I wasn’t invited to the wedding, nor would I have expected an invitation. Marie and I did part as friends, but had not spoken to each other for about 3 years.
I had no problem finding dates while I was at university. But I never really connected with any of the girls that I met, and I didn’t feel that there was anyone I wanted a long term relationship with just then. I don’t know what I was looking for at the time, but I did have sort of an attraction to those girls who wore glasses. I don’t think I was trying to replace Marie, but I just found that I really liked the appearance of a glasses wearing girl.
After I finished university I worked around the state with a road building crew for a couple of years. I was an engineer, and my experience with the road building company was to later stand me in good stead. When I got tired of bouncing from place to place I went back home and found a job with a large engineering firm that was involved in a variety of projects ranging from new construction to urban renewal. I rented myself an apartment and set up housekeeping on my own, even though my mom wanted me to live at home.
After I had graduated, but before I started working I had seen a notice in the paper announcing the engagement of Laurie Coburn to Matt Dyament. I didn’t think any more of this, but of course it registered in my mind that Laurie was getting married. That is why I was surprised one Friday night when I spotted Laurie with a couple of other girls at one of the bars in the neighborhood. But I chalked this up to the probability that Laurie was just out with some friends celebrating some special occasion.
Mom raised me to be a good church going Catholic. Unfortunately it didn’t really take, but even now, at age 25, mom was always after me to accompany her to church on Sunday. I was able to get out of it most of the time. After all, if Dad wouldn’t go with her, why should I? But, every so often I broke down and went with her. It made her feel good, and there were certainly many times in my younger years when I had made her life a little miserable. I owed it to her, and if spending a couple of hours on a Sunday morning with my mom meant so much to her I was happy. That was how I happened to notice who I thought was the former Laurie Coburn in church with her mother one Sunday.
I managed to get mom to leave the church as Laurie and her mom were walking out. I smiled at Laurie and said “Hi” to her. She answered back, and her mom saw my mom and they immediately started talking, as they were in some church group together.
“You are looking great Laurie. Married life must be agreeing with you.” I said.
“Thanks for the compliment Jake, but I am not married.” Laurie replied.
“Oh, I saw an announcement a few years ago that said that you and Matt were getting married. I guess you didn’t go through with it.” I replied.
“I would have, but Matt backed out.” Laurie replied.
“He must have been crazy. You look really good these days Laurie, and I always remember you as a super nice person.” I said.
“There was something about me Matt couldn’t handle, so we never went through with it. That pretty well soured me on guys for a while.” Laurie replied.
For the life of me I couldn’t figure out what there was about Laurie that Matt couldn’t handle. She was extremely attractive and had a fantastic figure. She was slim and trim, with nice brown hair that hung to her shoulders. It sure couldn’t have been anything in the looks department.
“If you are available I would love to take you to dinner tonight Laurie.” I said.
“Sorry Jake, but I am helping mom cook for my 2 brothers and their families. They are coming by this afternoon.” Laurie said.
“Would you be free this Friday night?” I asked.
“I am. Would you be willing to take me to Dominick’s?” Laurie asked.
“I take it that is your favorite place. Sure, we can go there.” I replied.
“Oh Laurie, invite Jacob over to our house for dinner tonight. He knows your brothers, and they will get along fine.” Mrs. Coburn said.
I guess the mothers had been listening to what Laurie and I had been saying. It seems that the older a mom gets the better her hearing is, especially when it is concerning an unmarried son or daughter. Laurie did extend an invitation to join their family, and I accepted. I knew Danny, her older brother better than I knew Kevin, who was 2 years younger than Laurie and I. Danny had been a pretty good football player back in high school, so everyone in the school took notice of Danny. If Kevin was a star it happened after Laurie and I graduated.
I had a fun evening. Both Danny and Kevin had married girls I knew slightly, and the evening was spent talking about our high school days. Matt Dyament had been a classmate of Danny’s and had played football with him, but his name wasn’t even mentioned that evening. I sort of took that to mean that the subject of Matt was taboo around the Coburn household. I really started to wonder what it was that made Matt break off with Laurie. She seemed to be every bit as nice a person as I remembered her.
Laurie and I dated for a few months. We were having a lot of fun, and had spent quite a bit of time together. Laurie made no secret about the fact that she wore contact lenses, although I knew that she had worn glasses, and then switched to contacts. And I also knew from what Skinny Minnie told me that Laurie had pretty thick glasses. But I never saw her wearing them, even though I would have loved to see her in her glasses.
After we had been going out together for about 6 months Laurie asked me if it would matter to me if she had to wear her glasses sometime. Of course I replied that it wouldn’t matter to me one way or another. I suppose that was the correct answer, because that started her talking about her glasses.
“Maybe you had better reserve your judgment until after you see me wearing my glasses. My eyesight is pretty bad and my glasses are very strong.” Laurie said.
“I can’t see why that would really matter. If you need to wear glasses then you should just wear them when you have to.” I said.
“Maybe I should wear them to the movies Saturday night.” Laurie said.
“You just go ahead and wear them whenever you want to. It will be fine with me. I can’t see where you would be any less attractive wearing glasses.” I replied.
“Other people have thought I was less attractive when I wore my glasses.” Laurie replied.
I thought about it for a minute or so. Was it possible that Matt didn’t care for Laurie’s appearance when she was wearing her glasses? If that was the case I was very fortunate, because that left her available for me.
When I came over to her house on Saturday night to pick Laurie up to go to the movies she was indeed wearing her glasses. She wasn’t kidding about having bad eyes and very strong glasses. I had no idea how strong those lenses were in her glasses. The lenses had to be close to ¾” thick at the outer edge, and there was an area that was around ¼” at the outside edge of the lens that didn’t have any of the power in it. But the frames were black plastic with wide temples and the lens shape was a rectangular shape. The glasses actually looked pretty darned good on Laurie’s face. I hoped she hadn’t noticed that I was a little taken aback when I saw how strong her glasses were. I immediately told her that I liked her choice of frames very much, and that her glasses looked quite nice on her.
“I hope you are not just saying that to be kind Jake.” Laurie said.
“No, I am not. Your glasses are, as you told me, very strong. But they do look good on you. I suppose that you have gotten the thinnest possible lenses, so if that is how your glasses have to look then I will have to get used to you wearing them. It was a little bit of a shock seeing you wearing them, because the last time I saw you wearing glasses they were a lot thinner. But there is nothing about them that I can’t accept whole heartedly.” I replied.
Laurie was pretty quiet that evening. I could see that wearing her glasses had taken a big effort on her part, and something told me that she hadn’t quite accepted the fact that I was just fine with her having to wear her strong glasses. Actually, seeing her wearing her glasses had made me very horny.
Laurie knew I had my own apartment. We had gone there to listen to music and talk some evenings and sometimes after a show we had gone there to hug and hold each other. I had decided I would take it slow and easy with Laurie, because something about her told me that she was a little bit fragile in a relationship. The show ended around 10:30, and the night was still young, so I asked Laurie if she wanted to stop by the apartment before I took her home. She agreed, so we headed for my apartment.
It was strange kissing a bespectacled Laurie. I did my darndest to keep from smudging her glasses, but when it was time for me to take her back home I could tell that her glasses were pretty smudged up and could stand a good cleaning. I asked her if I could clean her glasses for her, and I carefully removed them from her face after she said yes. I took them over to the tap, and carefully rubbed some dish soap on the lenses as I ran warm water over them. I had never felt such a deep curvature in lenses before. When I had them cleaned I took a very clean dry cotton cloth and polished all the water spots off. When I was satisfied that they were clean I took them back to Laurie, and placed them in her hand. She carefully put them on her nose and slid them up to the bridge of her nose. She looked around and told me I had done a really good job of cleaning them.
“If you would marry me I would gladly clean your glasses for you all the time.” I said.
“Are you asking me to marry you?” Laurie asked.
“All you have to do is to say yes and I would marry you in a minute.” I replied.
“It is still a little too soon for me to commit to you Jake. I like you a lot, and I am pleased that after you saw me wearing my glasses you didn’t turn tail and run the other way. Can you give me just a little more time?” Laurie asked.
“How long – a week, a month, a year?” I asked.
“I need at least another month. Can I give you my answer then?” Laurie asked.
“I can wait. Good things are worth waiting for.” I replied.
As I waited for the next month to pass Laurie and I were still enjoying dating. A couple of times during the month when I came by to pick her up Laurie met me at the door wearing her glasses. The first time she did that she asked me if I minded if she wore her glasses. Of course I said that it didn’t matter to me as long as she was comfortable. The second time she didn’t say a word, but just came out and jumped in the car with me. It was almost as if she was testing my reaction towards her wearing her glasses.
Finally the month that she had asked for had passed. We were finally having dinner at Dominick’s, her favorite restaurant on the Friday evening, and I was determined I was going to get my answer.
“Have you had long enough to tell me if you will marry me or not?” I asked.
“Yes, I have. If you still want me to, I will marry you.” Laurie replied.
“Oh, there is no doubt in my mind that I still want you to marry me. All I have been able to think about this past month is what would I do if you turned me down.” I answered.
“I had to be sure Jake. Matt hurt me very much, and I swore I wouldn’t let it happen again.” Laurie said.
“What could he have done to you to hurt you so badly?” I asked.
“I don’t really want to talk about it. It still upsets me to even think about it.” Laurie said.
As we finished our meal I was thinking about what it could be that Matt hurt her over. A nagging suspicion was in the back of my mind. One day when I had been talking with Laurie about the breaking off of her engagement with Matt she had told me that there was something about her that Matt couldn’t handle. Then another time she had said that other people had found her less attractive when she was wearing her glasses. Also, the couple of times that she had worn her glasses on dates over the last month had left me feeling that she was testing me. Maybe Matt hated her wearing her glasses and that is why the engagement was broken off.
“Matt really hated seeing you wearing your glasses did he?’ I asked.
“How could you have known that?” Laurie asked.
“I just made a stab at guessing. I think I was right though.” I replied.
“Yes, you were. Soon after Matt and I had announced our engagement I ended up with an eye infection. I couldn’t wear my contact lenses until the infection had cleared up. And, as you know, I am nearly blind without my glasses. So I had no other option but to wear glasses. I had told Matt before I even started going out with him that I wore really strong glasses, and I was not prepared for his reaction when he showed up to pick me up the first day I was wearing glasses. He told me I looked like hell wearing my glasses, and if I had to wear them there was no way he was going out with me. I tried to tell him that it was only until my eye infection cleared up, but he was not willing to even go anywhere with me wearing glasses. There wasn’t much use of us getting married after that and we broke up.” Laurie said.
”Then my thoughts were correct. You were testing me over the last month to see if I would have any sort of negative reaction to you wearing your glasses.” I replied.
“I was Jake. I just couldn’t go through that heartache again.” Laurie said.
“It is a good thing that I find you just as attractive when you are wearing glasses as when you are not then, isn’t it.” I answered.
“It definitely makes me feel a lot better about getting married to you. Your reaction has shown me that you accept me even though my eyes are so bad.” Laurie told me.
“Can we set a date then?” I asked.
“Let’s see when we can get a hall for the reception. They are pretty well booked for a year in advance but if we are flexible we might be able to find a date that isn’t booked a little sooner. That is unless you don’t want to get married sooner than a year or more from now?” Laurie asked.
“Laurie, I would marry you tomorrow. I don’t need a big fancy wedding and I would be just as happy to go to city hall and get married in front of a JP.” I answered.
“You know that won’t be an option. Our mothers will want a church wedding, so let’s just plan on having one. That would be a battle we just couldn’t win.” Laurie said with a laugh in her voice.
I knew Laurie was right on that. Our parents would definitely want a proper church wedding. And I didn’t mind waiting for a wedding either. So I took Laurie’s left hand in mine and slipped the ring I had purchased onto her ring finger.
“Now we are properly engaged.” I said.
Tears welled up in her eyes, and I was hoping they were tears of joy. It must have been quite a blow to her psyche when Matt refused to go through with her first engagement because of her poor eyesight and her thick glasses..
“Hey, don’t cry, be happy.” I said.
“I am happy, that’s why I am crying.” Laurie choked out.
“If you don’t stop crying you will wash your contacts out of your eyes, and then we will have a problem.” I said
‘I have my glasses.” Laurie said.
“And you now have a guy who likes to see you wearing them. But contacts in your strength must be expensive, so maybe you should go to the washroom and take them out.” I said.
“I can do that right here. I am so blind that I have to do it all by feel anyway.” Laurie replied.
The more I saw Laurie wearing her glasses the more accustomed I became to the strong thick lenses. I was used to her look in glasses now, and she looked even sexier wearing her glasses than she did with her contact lenses. I was finding her glasses to be a huge turn on for me.
“I’ll bet those babies aren’t cheap.” I said referring to her glasses.
“It’s not as bad these days. I only need new ones every couple of years. Back when I was in school I sometimes needed 3 new pairs in a year. And you are correct. My glasses now cost me around $1,000.00 for the frame and lenses. Sometimes if I am careful I can get them on sale for half price though.” Laurie replied.
“If that’s what they cost we will just have to spend the money. Fortunately I make enough to keep you in glasses for the rest of your life.” I replied.
That night after we finished eating we went back to my apartment and sat around watching a movie. After the movie I asked Laurie if she wanted me to drive her home, or if she was ready to share my bed. To my surprise she answered that she might as well stay over, since we needed to be up early the next morning.
I didn’t take advantage of the situation, and we merely hugged and held each other that night until we fell asleep. The next morning we again held each other for a while before we got up and showered together. I had to scrub Laurie’s body for her because she didn’t have her shower glasses and couldn’t see things like the soap or the shampoo and cream rinse. I was beginning to see just how visually impaired she actually was, but it didn’t matter to me because I was going to love my job as the seeing eye husband.
I handled it right that first night because it soon became fairly routine to have Laurie sleeping over. She brought some clothing by, and she also brought her old pair of shower glasses. She told me she couldn’t see much in the distance with them anymore, but she could see well enough to shower in them. Apparently when Laurie got a new pair of glasses her old ones were saved for a backup pair, and her old backup pair became her shower glasses.
We had a storybook wedding and reception. We had rented a 2 bedroom apartment as soon as the lease was up on my old 1 bedroom, and we had moved everything into it over the past month. Now we were going to be living there as man and wife.
It didn’t matter to me what Laurie’s glasses prescription was, so I have never asked her. But once we were living together I found out that her contact lenses were -22D from the bottles they came in. Someday I am sure that we will go to the eye doctor together and I will know how strong her glasses are. But until that day comes I am just happy that my wife was rejected by another because of her myopia.
Specs4ever Dec 2012