TMI: Eye Exam

I just had an eye exam.  I learned something new.  They tested me for depth perception for the first time ever and discovered I have very little.

….

O.M.G.

….

Suddenly, 50 years of failure makes sense to me.  I sucked at baseball.  I couldn’t catch a ball thrown at me or hit one with a bat.  Dad just said I needed more practice.  Coaches all told me the universally accepted advice, “get behind the ball”, not understanding that “behind the ball” is exactly the wrong place for a person who has no depth perception.  Even if the ball hits my glove, the glove doesn’t close and it pops out.  There is no amount of practice that will give me depth perception.

I now know why I sucked at dodge-ball, and football, and basketball, and tennis, and every other sport with a ball or that required eye-hand coordination.  It was NEVER going to be something I could ever do well.

Add that to smaller than average hands and gripping anything larger than a softball was also going to be challenging for me.  I still struggle to control large drinks handed to me at the McD’s drive up window.

This also explains why I never saw the attraction in 3D movies.  To me, they always looked like blurrier, darker versions of better movies.  I couldn’t understand why anyone would pay extra to see them.

Parents.  Do your kids a favor.  Get them tested before you hand them over to a sports coach who will mercilessly try to make them good at something they are biologically incapable of doing.  Don’t torture your kids like that.  Your kids want your approval and if they have this problem, they will never get it.  You have just set them up for a lifetime of failure, regrets and “daddy issues”.