Oddly, given what I do for a living, I’m most uncomfortable drawing attention to myself, especially if it’s something to do with what I’m wearing. And still more if it concerns my glasses. I trace this back to my shame and embarrassment when I first had to wear specs 43 years ago. For most of that time I’ve got on fine wearing contact lenses but once long-sightedness joined short-sightedness on the lengthening list of my physical shortcomings, bifocal spectacles became more practical.
I bought a pair last summer which looked, to my underperforming eyes, like perfectly normal specs. My only reservation was that from some angles they bore similarities to the kind of stout-rimmed eyewear favoured by many men in my line of work. Let’s call it the “media wanker” style. But it was more serious than that. Upon arriving home, the initial, visceral reaction of my loved ones was along the lines of: “WTF are those specs about?”
OK, I’d made a terrible, expensive mistake. I despaired at my stupidity. That was fine, despair I can deal with – it’s hope that kills me. And hope, if I can call it that, came in the shape of many alternative, diametrically opposed reviews. “Love those glasses!” exclaimed many friends, colleagues and complete strangers. But I’m never more than three compliments away from an unsolicited comment along the lines of: “Are you trying to look like a media wanker?” Or: “They look silly.”
I don’t mind the insults so much as the attention. Glasses are like football referees in that they are not there to be noticed – their job is to just do a job. I’d ditch them, but they were far too expensive to dump, so I’ll have to soldier on in the hope that, as with everything else I spend money on, they soon fall to pieces.
One close friend insists they make me look like “the bloke from Up”. Perhaps there’s work for me as a lookalike. It might be one way of saving up for a new pair of specs – specs about which no one has a good or a bad word to say.
• Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist
