I can see clearly now

Looking back on my life in glasses

I was in fourth grade when fate joined me with prescription glasses.

I was sitting in the last row of the classroom, as far from the blackboard and teacher as possible. This wasn’t necessarily my choice; although I tend to be a backbencher by nature, the fact that my last name begins with “W” generally resulted in a spot in the back of every classroom with my bottom-of-the-alphabet compadres.

(I would imagine, what with all of the political correctness these days, the “Ws” are no longer exclusively relegated to the back of the class. But I digress …)

Something new was in the works that day: A class project was on the pull-down screen in front of the blackboard, and the teacher took turns ensuring we were engaged/awake by randomly calling on us to read portions of the assignment.

Reading wasn’t a problem for me, as you can probably imagine from my line of work, and soon it was my turn. Immediately, I began stumbling over one word after another.

First, I was frustrated. Then I was embarrassed. Then I was silent.

Maybe the teacher saw me squinting. Maybe she had a hunch. But in what presumably was an attempt to help, she methodically moved me up one seat in the row, and then another, and then another, as I continued to stumble over the words.

Now, I have to admit that by the time I was temporarily seated in the front row having displaced four or five chuckling classmates along the way — my reading difficulty was more a function of water in my eyes than my inability to see the screen.

Regardless, the teacher sent home a note suggesting my parents have my eyesight checked out.

Soon thereafter, I was selecting my first set of prescription glasses from among the five or so “youth” options available at Duling Optical in Detroit Lakes, Minn. Those black horn-rimmed beauties went through a lot with me — touch football games, Little League baseball, my first (and last) junior high dance, lots of good and some less-than-good grades, and the usual other collection of school-age fun.

I’ve worn glasses every day since, with 12 or so months off for contacts my first year in college — I wanted to make a good impression, I suppose, as if wearing glasses was really a life-changing negative.

It turned out the original “hard” contacts, combined with the wind and cold of Chicago mornings, just weren’t for me.

Every five or so years since, I’ve wound up with either a new set of frames, lenses or — pocketbook willing — both.

And that’s a long-winded way of explaining why my column picture looks different today. Maybe you noticed; maybe you didn’t.

The photo needed to be changed anyway. A few months ago, someone recognized me in a restaurant and suggested I didn’t look like myself.

“Your hair looks a lot whiter in person than it is in the magazine,” she told me, simply stating the obvious.

So now I will gaze out at you with whiter hair, a lighter beard and a new set of glasses.

I can see a lot better with these glasses, too, so it should be easier for me to connect with you now that I’ll be able to see more clearly if you’re wearing glasses or not.

To see The progression of rick Wamre’s frame fashion since elementary, visit oakcliff.advocatemag.com and search: glasses.

Rick Wamre is president of Advocate Media. Let him know how we are doing by writing to 6301 Gaston, Suite 820, Dallas 75214; or email rwamre@advocatemag.com.

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Where is the love?

Apparently the only long-term committed couples Rachel Stone could find or sees worthy of a Valentine’s feature in Oak Cliff [“Love, honor, cherish,” February Advocate] are white, heterosexual, Protestants. —Joe

Tirk

Joe, we put out a number of calls for volunteers to participate in the story, or for readers such as you to nominate people to be included in this story — both in print and online — and we came up with some good love stories. However, we didn’t exclude anyone by race or gender, and we don’t publish information based on arbitrary quotas, either. If you know of someone you believe should have been included, pass that information to Rachel. I’m sure it’s not the last story about neighborhood love that we’ll write.

—Rick Wamre, Advocate president

It took a village

One of the first things that happened in Bishop Arts was that it was made a conservation district, and most all the structures were placed on the National Registry of Historic Places [“Boarded up on Bishop,” February Advocate]. Structures on this list that are used for commercial uses qualify for significant tax breaks at the federal level. Most all of the buildings in Bishop Arts took advantage of these tax breaks in their rehabilitation to become what you see today. Old buildings need these kind of financial incentives or often get torn down. I hope that Jefferson gets the same treatment because it deserves it, and the buildings need it.

—Michael Amonett

rstone@advocatemag.com