Mar 01 2010
Blinded by the Light, Part Two
In a post about 18 months ago (”Blinded by the Light”), I described how blinding the setting afternoon sun was: I could see nothing else, and my eyes recovered so slowly from the glare that I couldn’t handle the quick light/dark transitions. I thought it was just a combination of lighting conditions and old, scratched sunglasses.
Turns out it may have been something more — the beginning signs of cataracts. If I didn’t feel old before that diagnosis, the C-word did the job.
Now it all makes sense: my reluctance to ride into the setting sun, the difficulty dealing with oncoming headlights at night, the increasing difficulty reading street signs because of double images (the manipulated image above gives you an idea). The good news is that cataract surgery is apparently not as traumatic as “We’re going to cut something out of your eye” would lead one to believe, and friends who’ve had the procedure rave about the results.
The bad news is that, because of my extremely high deductible, it’s going to cost me the equivalent of a Triumph Daytona 675. 
