Glasses missed out on exciting trip

I should be outside raking leaves, but I don’t want to lose my glasses.

Let me explain, or try to.

Some years back, probably about 2007 or so, I received an unusual present.

At my age, that’s to be expected. I don’t really need anything. While we’re not hoarders, there’s going to be plenty to clean up after we’re gone.

The bookshelves are full and groaning. It would take a couple of months to listen non-stop to all the CDs on hand. Walls are covered with art and memorabilia.

And don’t get me started on the contents of the attic of the garage.

So I’m tough to buy for.

That, apparently, is why I was given a fancy, shiny, collapsible and extendable rake.

It didn’t make the job of cleaning up autumn leaves any easier, but it sure looked cool. As I said, it was shiny.

But one afternoon in early November, one of those days when you know you’d better get the yard under control before it’s covered in a foot of snow, the rake exploded.

Maybe that’s the wrong word. It disassembled itself in my hands. It flew apart in the middle of a strong raking action as I tried to get the maple and redbud and hackberry and oak leaves under control.

Apparently, the collapsible feature of the rake decided to collapse a little early.

That provoked a laugh and some teasing.

But a few minutes later, I noticed that my glasses were missing.

The rake explosion had somehow knocked my bifocals right of the bridge of my nose.

“Where are my glasses?” I shouted.

Good question. Really good question.

Connie and I put down our rakes and started rummaging through the leaf piles.

Less than three minutes had passed, but the glasses had disappeared.

We scoured piles of leaves on the ground. We dumped out a recently-filled lawn bag and pawed through it.

Nothing.

It was as if the glasses had disappeared from the face of the earth when the fancy rake fell apart.

Hours went by. Still no glasses.

I had an old pair I could use as a spare, since my prescription hadn’t changed much.

There was just one problem.

The glasses disappeared on a Sunday afternoon. We were booked on a flight to South Africa on Tuesday.

That trip had been in the works for nearly a year. My friend Gyles Webb, a member of the PHS Class of ’66, had stayed at our house during the 40th class reunion and had invited us to be his guest for a reciprocal visit on my 60th birthday.

On Monday, I went to Dr. David Fullenkamp’s office and learned what I expected to learn: It wasn’t possible to come up with a new pair of glasses as a replacement instantly. My old pair would have to do.

And it did. The trip was great. Gyles and his wife Barbara were magnificent, and I was able to get a new pair of peepers when I got home.

That would have been the end of the story, but then this summer, while working on her garden, my wife found the missing glasses.

Twelve years later, the battered spectacles had turned up.

One lens was missing. The frame was bent. And they were covered with mud.

But they were found.

Too bad for them that they missed out on that once-in-a-lifetime trip to South Africa.