Al’s Miracle Eyes!

Al went to his ophthalmologist Friday, November 16, and got an excellent report! He’s eyes are healed, well ahead of schedule! He was initially told he would need to use two eyes drops four times a day for four to six weeks after surgery for each eye. Friday the doctor told him he can stop all drops in both eyes now! “Oh, that’s great,” I said. “That means he won’t have to be putting them in while we are in Antarctica.” And Al added, “Yeah, because they would probably freeze before they got to my eye, and bounce off my eyeball!” Yes, it would have been inconvenient, to say the least, to put two sets of drops in each eye four times a day while trekking about the frozen continent! It has been exactly one month since he had his left eye operated on, and only 17 days since his right eye had the procedure! That’s a miracle! Thank you, God!

He now has 20/25 vision and no longer needs glasses for far vision! In fact, he already gathered up all his old eye glasses and gave them to charity. He no longer has to put up with nose pieces pinching him, he no longer sees stigmatic auras around lights at night, and he can read the tiniest writing on cars and vehicles. In fact, whenever we stop at a stop light, he reads all the license plates, bumper stickers, and any other print on all the cars around him. “I can read that!” he yells excitedly. He uses “over the counter” reading glasses from drugstores, no prescription required. He even went out and bought his own pair so he doesn’t have to use my diamond studded ones any more.

We went to church this morning to celebrate St. Andrews Day. He is one of the saints from Scotland, so Al wore his kilt. We always have a bag piper who wears a kilt on this one day of the year. I think Dorothy started something with her Celtic wedding and Dad’s kilt. Usually the bag piper is the only one who in a kilt, but today four men were wearing them! And the priest asked them to process in behind the bag piper! And the wives processed with them. A lawyer who attends church with us is always giving Al a hard time for wearing a kilt. So I warned him about the kilt and jokingly added, “You’re not going to Baker Act him, are you?” to which the lawyer replied, “Well, since he hasn’t been Baker Acted yet, I won’t bother him.” Hmm, I’m sure over the years there have been many people who had wished Al had been Baker Acted!

Note: for those who are not familiar with this term, it refers to a law that allows courts to declare a person mentally unstable and put them in a psychiatric hospital for observation.

 Pictures show two of Al’s favorite plants, the red and fuchsia bougainvilleas. There are close-ups of the blooms. The other pictures show the view I have looking through the gate while sitting on the deck in my backyard. One shows Al’s hummingbird, ringed by foliage. The other shows the red bougainvillea with the fuchsia one in the background.