When I was younger, I associated wearing glasses with two things: old people (librarians, grandparents) and nerds (Saved By the Bell anyone?). Then in fourth grade, I got the news: I would need a pair of my own. At first, I was saddened by this news. Glasses? Really? But I soon adjusted and eventually glasses became a part of my identity. Without them I know I can't see, and I realized that they are not just for old folks and geeks, but rather they served the purpose of allowing sight.
However, in recent years, in an instance of bricolage, glasses have taken on a new meaning due to the hipster subculture. If you walk anywhere in the village, especially on the NYU campus, you are sure to see people wearing thick plastic frames that are over the top noticeable and years ago would have only been seen on fans of talk show host Sally Jessy Raphael (pictured), not on "fashionable" young adults.
I think this change in glasses as a device to give sight to a fashionable accessory is quite ironic because as someone who is always going to need to wear glasses, I often think about how much I would love to have perfect vision and not need glasses or contacts. Ironically, people who don't even need glasses, wear these ridiculous frames just to look "cool" (even though half the time they look ridiculous as their frames are 50 times the size of their face); they don't even realize how much glasses are a burden to people like me who can't see five inches in front of them. Eventually however, when glasses go out of style, these hipsters will just stop wearing their frames (or, if in the odd chance they actually do have poor vision, they will revert to contacts). I on the other hand, will keep wearing my glasses.
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