isaacc7's Friends

1000 Times Blind
Crazy couple of weeks. Jamie is all kinds of pregnant with our second child - a son -- and she's been working on a charming Fox sitcom called Brothers (she's Jolene, the hugely pregnant recurring waitress). I did another Big Bang Theory, airing November 23rd, and my episode features Katee Sackhoff. And me, but you're probably much less interested in me right now. Oh, and yesterday I had surgery. Elective surgery -- you know, the fun kind.

I started wearing glasses the summer before 5th grade. I was the lone kid with glasses for a few years there, before high school, where a bunch more pairs started showing up in class pictures. Around tenth grade, my eyesight really plummeted, and I needed to wear them all the time. My first pair were tinted on top, clear on the bottom, which struck me as a great idea. It wasn't. Between that and my requisite flannel shirt, I look like your gay dad.

When I became an actor (27) I initially booked a lot while wearing glasses, but I felt like it was time for a change, and I wanted the option of occasionally not wearing them when the part suited. Lasik was still in its awkward adolescence, so I got contacts. This was a big deal -- growing up, contacts couldn't treat astigmatism, and it was only in the 90s that they could. And lasik, at the time, was fraught with horrorstories. Problems with depth perception. Color distinction. Night vision. I was not about to have my eyes involved with any sort of beta testing.

So I wore contacts for 9 years. 9 years of getting up every morning and putting a foreign object on top of my eye. 9 years of remembering to take them out before a nap, or paying for it dearly. 9 years of having them tear or fall out -- one time on set. When I was supposed to drive a car. At night. In the rain. Look at the footage from that episode of Monk I did. You can see me, but I really can't see you.

When my last pair of contacts dried out while I was downtown, and Jamie had to drive me home, I said no more. At the recommendation of a friend I called the Caster Eye Center and made an appointment. The consultation was great -- I was shown the procedure room, a climate controlled lab where the Lasik is actually performed. Next to the operating table is a small assortment of stuffed animals that patients -- weak, softhearted patients -- can use. There's also a basket in the front for your old eyeglasses. They'll be sent to South America, to help nearsighted people in the third world. Nice.

Yesterday, Jamie drove me to the office in Beverly Hills. I talked incessantly the whole way there. "This guy? Doctor Caster? He did a bunch of the Lakers. And he wrote a book about it. And he had it done himself!"
Jamie screeched to a halt. "He did it to HIMSELF?"
"What? No, he - heh - he had it done himself. Wow." We laughed. "Yeah, he did his own Lasik. That ain't shit, ask him about his vasectomy." We laughed harder. I laughed really hard at my own joke, because I was increasingly terrified. Who signs on for this? How can this be possible? How can a laser slice open my cornea, refold it, replace it and thus correct my vision? What kind of Phillip K. Dick nightmare have I signed on for?

At the office, I sat down for a battery of tests. All the way thinking -- hey, in a little while I'm gonna have my cornea sliced open by a fucking laser. My uncorrected vision? 20/200 in my good eye, 20/stick and a dog in the other one. Between exams, Jamie pointed to a testimonial on the wall. Henry Rollins had had his lasik done here. If it was good for Hank, goddamit, I was gonna rise above and deal with this. then again, Rollins watched a dear friend of his die of a gunshot wound and toured in a van with notorious douchebag Greg Ginn. Getting a laser in his eye is probably no biggie.

I am given two Xanax, which make me feel good. I'm relaxed but still antsy, but also sleepy. And I wanna get this over with. I am taken into the procedure room. I kick off my shoes and lie down, and then immediately get back up and grab a stuffed Tigger from next to the table. It becomes very apparent that a third Xanax would have been in order. Looking directly into a green light, i have an anesthetic dropped into my eye, until it feels like an errant tooth. Anesthetic or no, I swear I can feel the cornea being cut and I let out a nervous squeal that escapes through clenched teeth. And then boom. It's over. Next eye, even less time. I sit up -- and I can see Jamie looking at me through the window. Across the room.

This morning I got up at 6 -- before my toddler -- and walked around the house looking at stuff. My beautiful sleeping wife. The dust that the light catches in the office. The palm fronds on the trees across the street. I went in to Dr. Casters for my one day follow up. Without squinting, I'm 20/15 in both eyes. My glasses, a slick pair of Giorgio Armani hornrims that I bought during a very pecuniary part of the early oughts -- are headed to South America.

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