I took my niece to the zoo the other week, and it didn’t go as well as I’d hoped. When we arrived, she immediately said she felt sick. I blamed it on the sugary cereal, offered her a few sips of water from her drink bottle, and we kept walking when she was feeling alright again. The zoo had been closed for months, and since we had been lucky enough to secure tickets on its re-opening day, I wasn’t going to let them go to waste! I basically dragged my niece through all of the different exhibits, but at every one, she said she couldn’t see the animal very well. I was confused. The giraffe was barely thirty metres away from us. How couldn’t she see it? Was she lying? Was she pranking me? I eventually figured it out.
I took her to one of the best optometrist practices Cheltenham has and explained the issue to the receptionist there. Since it was a weekday, we were able to get a walk-in appointment virtually straight away. I couldn’t believe how efficient this place was! The optometrist had a calming demeanour (which was helpful, as I was sort of freaking out), and she asked both myself and my niece to describe what was going on, so that she could get both versions of events. Of course, in typical children’s fashion, my niece said that the sugary cereal was causing her vision to go blurry. The optometrist kindly dismissed this idea, and suggested she conduct an eye test for children. She assured my niece that it wouldn’t hurt at all, and brought us in front of a huge sheet of paper stuck to the wall, and an odd-looking metal machine with eye holes to look through. I seem to remember something similar from my own childhood, though it’s been a while since I’ve been to an optometrist myself. In the end, my niece needed glasses. Her vision is actually pretty bad. I don’t know how she managed each day without them!