I have always had vision issues – I think when I was in the 3rd or 4th grade, I first owned glasses for the classroom and for movies. By the time I was married, I needed correction all the time, and I purchased contacts. With each pregnancy, my vision worsened, until currently, I have 20 / 200 vision, corrected to 20 / 20 with contacts.
Something was irritating my right eye yesterday to the point of distraction / crazed-ness … and in a fit of desperation, I took out my contact lens whilst driving. I was commenting to my daughter, "If I close my right eye, I can see perfectly. If I close my left eye … I can't read anything and there are no windows on any of the houses and everything on the horizon blurs together …" Meanwhile she is yelling, "Open your eye, Mom, I don't wanna die!"
We were headed to the airport (a 100 mile drive) and it took about 30 miles for the irritation in my eye to calm down. During those miles, I kept testing out the non-corrected eye, comparing it to the one with the contact lens. I couldn't help it. I was fascinated with how terrible my vision was and also how my brain tried to reconcile the two images it was receiving.
Each of us has whole areas of blindness – things we aren't aware of. Things we minimize and think aren't that bad. Things we try to offset. But it doesn't change the fact that they are there and we are, in fact, broken in this particular realm.
The key to working with your shortcomings is a) admitting that your vision is less than perfect, and b) arranging for some sort of compensation for that deficiency. If you know you are impulsive with money, make a rule that you never buy anything without waiting 24 hours first, or inviting the opinion of someone you trust. If you suck at fashion, make sure you have a couple people who you can bounce your wardrobe off of.
We all are short-sighted in some area. No one has a 20 / 20 life. But some of us somehow think that the way we see things IS 20 / 20 and we are unwilling to even try on another lens to see if somehow that will improve something.
I gotta say, there is no glory in blurry.