And, for the 6-year-olds, they may actually believe I am a pirate.
April 23, 2017 2:36 PM Subscribe
Living with an Eye Patch in a Big City This week alone, two complete strangers have asked me outright, “What happened to your eye?” This happens to me all the time; sometimes, I get a “Hello!” first. For years, this constant questioning made me really mad. I felt like I could never hide. I didn't understand why strangers would ask such a personal question. After fielding this question hundreds of times, though, I have learned that most people are not trying to make me feel bad. Usually the opposite is true.
I believe this phenomenon is what inspired the Momus song “Is It Because I'm A Pirate”.
posted by acb at 3:00 PM on April 23, 2017 [6 favorites]
posted by acb at 3:00 PM on April 23, 2017 [6 favorites]
I honestly don't know why people over the age of 12 feel the need to comment on or question another's appearance.
Some twenty years ago I was travelling in the US with a couple of friends for a few days. One of the friends was a fellow, John by name, who was and is built short and broad like an old-time wrassler. John's parents emigrated to Canada from Japan before he was born, and he is 100% East Asian by ancestry. He was heavily tanned that year, to the point of having almost an olive-skinned complexion. He also had his hair dyed blond that summer, had grown a King Tut-esque goatee – undyed – as long and thick as three fingers, and was wearing sunglasses much of the time when outdoors (which concealed his eyes' epicanthic folds).
Notwithstanding that he was a distinctive-looking fellow, I was astonished by the sheer number of strangers who stopped him in the street and demanded WHAT ARE YOU?!?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:16 PM on April 23, 2017 [4 favorites]
Some twenty years ago I was travelling in the US with a couple of friends for a few days. One of the friends was a fellow, John by name, who was and is built short and broad like an old-time wrassler. John's parents emigrated to Canada from Japan before he was born, and he is 100% East Asian by ancestry. He was heavily tanned that year, to the point of having almost an olive-skinned complexion. He also had his hair dyed blond that summer, had grown a King Tut-esque goatee – undyed – as long and thick as three fingers, and was wearing sunglasses much of the time when outdoors (which concealed his eyes' epicanthic folds).
Notwithstanding that he was a distinctive-looking fellow, I was astonished by the sheer number of strangers who stopped him in the street and demanded WHAT ARE YOU?!?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:16 PM on April 23, 2017 [4 favorites]
Another piece by the same author: Seeing Myself. And her bio mentions that she was dealing with breast cancer last year. Fuck cancer, man.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 4:35 PM on April 23, 2017
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 4:35 PM on April 23, 2017
Notwithstanding that he was a distinctive-looking fellow, I was astonished by the sheer number of strangers who stopped him in the street and demanded WHAT ARE YOU?!?
In what hell-scape world do people come from where it is appropriate at all to ask that question to a stranger
posted by littlesq at 4:44 PM on April 23, 2017 [8 favorites]
In what hell-scape world do people come from where it is appropriate at all to ask that question to a stranger
posted by littlesq at 4:44 PM on April 23, 2017 [8 favorites]
I have had long-ass rocker hair, auburn; long-ass rocker hair, gandalf grey; punk rock spiky hair, manic panic green; and punk rock spiky hair, laurie anderson grey. Concurrent to each of these (and more) I have had my eye go out for months at a time, requiring an eyepatch. Except for the part where my brain forgets about the patched side of the body for a while spatially, causing me to run into doorframes and people, it's always been kind of fun. Can't say I have ever been quizzed about the eyepatch as a part of my getup.
posted by mwhybark at 5:03 PM on April 23, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by mwhybark at 5:03 PM on April 23, 2017 [1 favorite]
Because I had what I thought were a lot of important things to do before starting graduate school one fall, I waited a couple of months to go to the doctor a second time after I got hit in the eye by a bungee cord during a long, summer bicycle trip, and by then, my slowly detaching retina, which could have been dealt with by a laser treatment during an office visit, required a 5 hour operation during which my right eyeball was popped out onto my cheek, burned in back with LN2 to secure the reattachment, dissected longitudinally to have a silicone rubber band embedded in the sclera, and then popped back into my head.
The end result looked like a big, freshly ground wad of lumpy hamburger with a plastic iris and pupil pasted onto it; and because of the inflammation and swelling, it bulged out of the socket much further than my other (fairly prominent) eye. I might have been able to get a special pair of sunglasses to wear, but my eyelid and lashes scraped across the inner surface of the lens of all the normal ones I tried.
So I just let it all hang out, so to speak, and I got a bunch of 'Oh my God! ... what happened to your eye??' type of reactions, which I answered in various ways according to my mood, but always at least politely, I hope.
I didn't really grasp the impact I was having on some people though, until a woman about my own age approached me from my left to ask a question as I was standing in front of a shelf of books at the university bookstore. I turned my head toward her only slightly for my first response, but kind of unthinkingly faced her fully for the second -- at which she burst instantly into tears.
Oh well, that stage only lasted for a few weeks.
posted by jamjam at 5:07 PM on April 23, 2017 [14 favorites]
The end result looked like a big, freshly ground wad of lumpy hamburger with a plastic iris and pupil pasted onto it; and because of the inflammation and swelling, it bulged out of the socket much further than my other (fairly prominent) eye. I might have been able to get a special pair of sunglasses to wear, but my eyelid and lashes scraped across the inner surface of the lens of all the normal ones I tried.
So I just let it all hang out, so to speak, and I got a bunch of 'Oh my God! ... what happened to your eye??' type of reactions, which I answered in various ways according to my mood, but always at least politely, I hope.
I didn't really grasp the impact I was having on some people though, until a woman about my own age approached me from my left to ask a question as I was standing in front of a shelf of books at the university bookstore. I turned my head toward her only slightly for my first response, but kind of unthinkingly faced her fully for the second -- at which she burst instantly into tears.
Oh well, that stage only lasted for a few weeks.
posted by jamjam at 5:07 PM on April 23, 2017 [14 favorites]
In what hell-scape world do people come from where it is appropriate at all to ask that question to a stranger
Ohio.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:10 PM on April 23, 2017 [25 favorites]
Ohio.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:10 PM on April 23, 2017 [25 favorites]
I have a fairly large port-wine stain on my face (amusingly to me, I often forget which side it's on since photos vs mirrors will show it on opposite sides). A few times, I've met kids on the street who have port wine stains and they're really excited to meet someone else with a visible mark like that. So I can understand the connection part of what she talks about there.
(It took me a while to realize that one of the reasons people remembered me (like, "hey! I went to high school with you!") much better than I remembered them was the big australia-shaped dark red mark taking up much of one cheek.)
posted by rmd1023 at 6:32 PM on April 23, 2017 [7 favorites]
(It took me a while to realize that one of the reasons people remembered me (like, "hey! I went to high school with you!") much better than I remembered them was the big australia-shaped dark red mark taking up much of one cheek.)
posted by rmd1023 at 6:32 PM on April 23, 2017 [7 favorites]
My friend and crewmate One-Eyed Mike got his moniker after he lost an eye in a sword fight about twelve years ago. (I swear every word of this is true.) He used to work as a server at the sadly lamented Piratz Tavern in Silver Spring, Maryland, where of course he dressed in full pirate garb. One day he had to go to court about a traffic ticket, but he had to go there directly from work, which meant he didn't have the opportunity to change.
The judge flipped his lid. "How dare you walk into my courtroom dressed like that?" and so forth. Mike explained that he was in his work clothes. The judge was mollified, but said, "Well, at least take the eye patch off."
Mike said, "Are you sure, Your Honor?"
"Yes, yes, take it off!"
"All right."
So Mike took off his eye patch, revealing his socket to the world.
And the judge said, "Okay, you can put it back on."
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:19 PM on April 23, 2017 [62 favorites]
The judge flipped his lid. "How dare you walk into my courtroom dressed like that?" and so forth. Mike explained that he was in his work clothes. The judge was mollified, but said, "Well, at least take the eye patch off."
Mike said, "Are you sure, Your Honor?"
"Yes, yes, take it off!"
"All right."
So Mike took off his eye patch, revealing his socket to the world.
And the judge said, "Okay, you can put it back on."
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:19 PM on April 23, 2017 [62 favorites]
(It took me a while to realize that one of the reasons people remembered me (like, "hey! I went to high school with you!") much better than I remembered them was the big australia-shaped dark red mark taking up much of one cheek.)
This is such a curse. I live where I grew up and at least a few times a month I'm approached by someone I have no recollection of, but they remember meeting me once 20 years ago. It's awkward but I don't know what they expect from me. I wonder if it'll slow down now that I've transitioned to male.
posted by AFABulous at 7:39 PM on April 23, 2017 [6 favorites]
This is such a curse. I live where I grew up and at least a few times a month I'm approached by someone I have no recollection of, but they remember meeting me once 20 years ago. It's awkward but I don't know what they expect from me. I wonder if it'll slow down now that I've transitioned to male.
posted by AFABulous at 7:39 PM on April 23, 2017 [6 favorites]
This is such a curse. I live where I grew up and at least a few times a month I'm approached by someone I have no recollection of, but they remember meeting me once 20 years ago. It's awkward but I don't know what they expect from me. I wonder if it'll slow down now that I've transitioned to male.
I knew a guy from before he had transitioned, and then ran into him afterwards, like five years later. He was all, hey, it's you! You look really different! Did you dye your hair? And so I told him, yes, I used to be blonde. I couldn't really place him. His face looked super familiar, but I couldn't put a name to it, and couldn't think where I knew him from. So I sort of felt him out with, "Yeah, and you look kind of different too... Have you changed something?"
And he answered, "Yeah. I used to live as a woman."
So I'm guessing people are still going to remember that they kind of know you, but they'll no longer be able to tell exactly where it is they know you from.
posted by lollusc at 8:17 PM on April 23, 2017 [4 favorites]
I knew a guy from before he had transitioned, and then ran into him afterwards, like five years later. He was all, hey, it's you! You look really different! Did you dye your hair? And so I told him, yes, I used to be blonde. I couldn't really place him. His face looked super familiar, but I couldn't put a name to it, and couldn't think where I knew him from. So I sort of felt him out with, "Yeah, and you look kind of different too... Have you changed something?"
And he answered, "Yeah. I used to live as a woman."
So I'm guessing people are still going to remember that they kind of know you, but they'll no longer be able to tell exactly where it is they know you from.
posted by lollusc at 8:17 PM on April 23, 2017 [4 favorites]
Oh, that's much worse. I'd rather have "oh hi, I was in your 6th grade science class!" than "Did you go to X high school? Hm, well did you work at Y company? Huh. Well, did you ever live in Seattle?"
posted by AFABulous at 8:28 PM on April 23, 2017
posted by AFABulous at 8:28 PM on April 23, 2017
I have largish jug ears which I was sensitive about until one day while taking my daughter to elementary school a child commented "you have a really big nose". Actually I think my nose is a fairly normal Scottish one but the commenter was Asian and their comment pretty much cured my ear size anxiety.
posted by anadem at 8:37 PM on April 23, 2017 [11 favorites]
posted by anadem at 8:37 PM on April 23, 2017 [11 favorites]
My friend and crewmate One-Eyed Mike got his moniker after he lost an eye in a sword fight about twelve years ago.
...
Huh. Well, did you ever live in Seattle?
Going on record here, not me. Eyes still work most of the time, although the shizz that leads to patching does probabilistically lead to loss of utility. Despite this, I am of course your crewmate.
posted by mwhybark at 8:59 PM on April 23, 2017
...
Huh. Well, did you ever live in Seattle?
Going on record here, not me. Eyes still work most of the time, although the shizz that leads to patching does probabilistically lead to loss of utility. Despite this, I am of course your crewmate.
posted by mwhybark at 8:59 PM on April 23, 2017
One of my best friends also had cancer take an eye. Handsome and single, the loss of it really shook his confidence. He asked me how I thought he would fare with the ladies after it was gone. He didn't think he wouldn't have much luck. You'll do just fine, I said. You're still you, it won't make any difference.
Well, as it turns out, we were both wrong. Women LOVED his eye patch. I mean, really loved it. It made him mysterious and sexy. (Apparently there was also some character on a soap who had an eye patch too.) He totally made it work for him and the ladies flocked to him, to the extent that our other male friends asked to borrow his spare eye patch in the hope that the magic would rub off!
Sadly, within five years the cancer had spread to his liver and we lost him, but if there was ever a case of making lemonade from lemons, Craig did it in spades.
posted by Jubey at 9:21 PM on April 23, 2017 [20 favorites]
Well, as it turns out, we were both wrong. Women LOVED his eye patch. I mean, really loved it. It made him mysterious and sexy. (Apparently there was also some character on a soap who had an eye patch too.) He totally made it work for him and the ladies flocked to him, to the extent that our other male friends asked to borrow his spare eye patch in the hope that the magic would rub off!
Sadly, within five years the cancer had spread to his liver and we lost him, but if there was ever a case of making lemonade from lemons, Craig did it in spades.
posted by Jubey at 9:21 PM on April 23, 2017 [20 favorites]
(Apparently there was also some character on a soap who had an eye patch too.)
posted by Jubey at 12:21 AM on April 24
That would be Patch Johnson, from Days of Our Lives.
Source: unrepentant soap opera fan during the '80s (though I never watched Days, I knew lots of women who did).
posted by magstheaxe at 5:15 AM on April 24, 2017
posted by Jubey at 12:21 AM on April 24
That would be Patch Johnson, from Days of Our Lives.
Source: unrepentant soap opera fan during the '80s (though I never watched Days, I knew lots of women who did).
posted by magstheaxe at 5:15 AM on April 24, 2017
That would be Patch Johnson, from Days of Our Lives.
Not to mention Snake Plissken! Who presumably attracts a whole different set of women.
posted by El Mariachi at 9:42 AM on April 24, 2017 [1 favorite]
Not to mention Snake Plissken! Who presumably attracts a whole different set of women.
posted by El Mariachi at 9:42 AM on April 24, 2017 [1 favorite]
I too used to work with a One-Eyed Mike, from Philly. Although this Mike lost his eye getting jumped by skinheads as an out gay young punk in the late 80s. Imagine Harvey Fiierstein's younger, tougher brother. With one eye.
No patch, tho. But me being Pirate, we got along well on tour.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 11:31 AM on April 24, 2017 [2 favorites]
No patch, tho. But me being Pirate, we got along well on tour.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 11:31 AM on April 24, 2017 [2 favorites]
Not to mention Snake Plissken!
I thought he was dead.
posted by rmd1023 at 1:35 PM on April 24, 2017 [1 favorite]
I thought he was dead.
posted by rmd1023 at 1:35 PM on April 24, 2017 [1 favorite]
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But with adults, it is really, really tedious to be pitied and underestimated. I can do anything you can do. I have been skydiving, I have hiked up mountains, I have a master's degree, I've traveled the country, etc. I don't think of myself as any different until it's pointed out, and then it's jarring.
I honestly don't know why people over the age of 12 feel the need to comment on or question another's appearance. If you wouldn't ask someone "why are you so fat" or "no, where are you really from," don't ask a stranger or acquaintance what "happened" to them.
posted by AFABulous at 2:54 PM on April 23, 2017 [27 favorites]