I’ve had a rare week.

Last Sunday, when David and I went for a hike in the splendid Columbia River Gorge, I noticed that I couldn’t “focus quite right.” By the evening I couldn’t see my monitor and by Monday I was pretty useless. I called in sick and made an appointment with my eye doctor.

Tuesday morning, I saw the eye doctor and he flipped some switches and whirled some charts and announced that I was apparently bionic, that my very, very bad eyesight had somehow improved about 50% overnight (from about -7.5 diopters to -4.5). He had no explanation for this. He gave me a new pair of contacts.

Once I’d left his office, though, I immediately knew something was amiss. Certain parts of my vision, sure, were sharp, but other segments still a blurry mess. What’s more, I was seeing double out of my left eye. And the contacts were uncomfortable. I took them off and called the eye doctor again; got an appointment for the next day.

When I went in to the opthamalogist’s for the second time–this being the same eye doctor I’ve had since I was, like, five, seriously, he was grumpy. Downright dismissive. He seemed irritated that I was bugging him and shrugged off my concerns. He whirled the same charts past me again. I told him: yes, the letters right in the center of my vision were in focus, but there were whorls of light around them and the rest of my field of vision was swimming.

Finally, begrudgingly, he said: “If it makes you feel better, I’ll refer you to a corneal specialist.”

Yes, it would make me feel a lot better. I was effectively blind. I couldn’t read, watch TV, or do anything. I was reduced to laying around in bed all week.

I didn’t get an appointment with the cornea people until Friday. The waiting room was a big public-clinic-style place, lots of bustling. I was anxious.

The doctor I finally saw after a couple of hours waiting dilated my eyes (something I’m very used to these days) and finally figured out what was going on–and boy is it mundane! She noted: “Your eyes look dry. Incredibly dry.” I guess, crazy dry, as it turns out. So dry, in fact, that my corneas had apparently shriveled up and my vision was effectively ruined. This explains a bit why certain parts of my field of vision were sort of in focus while the rest was a smudged mess.

She prescribed lubricating drops which I have to put in my eyes every hour. I started doing this yesterday afternoon. As of now (Saturday night), my right eye is approaching normal-ish again but my left is still unhappy. But, wow, an amazing improvement. I can see my monitor again (though it does take a bit of squinting) and I don’t feel like I’m completely blind anymore.

Weird, a bit scary, and such a boring cause.