This is the second installment of five true stories coming from our employees at GlassesUSA who wear prescription eyeglasses. These stories tell us how they found out they needed vision correction. The second story comes from one of the employees from our production department...

"As a kid, I was really active in sports and the boy scouts. I was pretty good at sports until about 8th grade. Sometime in junior high school, things started to get a bit blurry - literally. I started noticing that people's faces were really hard to see the further away they were. I was playing baseball one day for my school and I really couldn't see the bases I was supposed to run. Everyone started to look like they belonged in Monet paintings. My grades started to slip also.

One of my teachers - Mrs. Montgomery, who taught Civil War history - noticed that I was not as active in class as I had been the year before when she taught some other history class. She decided to call my parents in for a little parent-teacher conference. My dad was so ticked off because he thought I did something really bad. Mrs. Montgomery sat my parents down and said "I think Scott has a problem seeing." My dad started to laugh because he couldn't believe that is what she called them in for. My mom was pretty attentive though. Mrs. M continued "I think your son needs prescription glasses. I think he's having a hard time seeing the black board."

Now, understand that this was 1980. If you think glasses are expensive now, try to think of what it was like back in the '70's and '80's when we barely had gasoline for our cars much less money to buy your kid eyeglasses. While my parents were relieved that the only problem was with my eyes and not my behavior - they started to freak out about the money. They thanked my teacher, came home, and that is when the fun began. My dad started to poke fun at me for needing glasses. I remember him saying "Hey, four-eyes, what if I just MAKE you eyeglasses? Maybe it's mind over matter..." I just looked at my mom and said "do I really need eyeglass frames? I swear, I can see just fine!"

No such luck! We went to the optometrist that weekend to have my eyes tested. My prescription was not that high but it did explain why people looked all wobbly on the baseball diamond. I tried to make my glasses look cool - it worked most of the time. I was an athlete so I didn't really get picked on for having glasses. Some of the girls told me I looked smarter. In the end, it was the best thing for me. My grades went up, I could finally see what people looked like from far away, and I stopped walking into things. Eventually, I got used to my glasses and I can't imagine not wearing them now." -S.C.