Sunday, January 31st, 2021

My work glasses fall apart as I take them off before lunch. Most of the frame stays in my left hand. The right temple lands on my desk. The glasses were cheap in the States. Five identical pairs cost something like seven or twelve dollars. I have several more pairs at home. I may even know where. But this is the pair that I keep at work, to use when looking at computer screens. One section of my trifocals is right for that, but it’s too narrow for me to see an entire monitor through it. I put the broken pair on to read screens during lunch and afterward, but they are off-kilter and slide off easily. At one point, I look at the break through my good glasses. The plastic around the screw that connects the temple to the frame has worn out. I try sliding the pieces together, but there isn’t enough plastic there to hold them in place. When I go down to the supermarket for a late-afternoon snack, I pick up some super-glue. At my desk, I carefully apply it to the hinge where the glasses broke. I fit the pieces together as precisely as I can and hold them in place for a minute or so. Some of the glue oozes out and bonds my thumb to my pointer finger. I put my glasses down and carefully pull my fingers apart, scraping the glue from between them. They detach from each other. Most of the glue comes off. The rest will wear away sometime during the week. I pick up the glasses and wiggle the connection. It’ll hold, though the hinge no longer bends. That isn’t a problem. The glasses never leave my desk. I give them one good tug to make sure the glue will hold, put them on, and get back to work.