An Odd Connection

In November of 1979 I found myself in Moscow enjoying a performance of the Moscow Circus. Yes, the dancing bears and such were great but still as a 17 year-old sitting in a communist country I was also guarded. Communism was bad, that's what I'd heard and certainly all these Russians sitting around me couldn't be as happy with their life as I was with mine. You might say that although I was enjoying the circus I was also looking around with one eyebrow raised trying to figure out what was really going on. I remember noticing that no one seemed to be wearing glasses. It freaked me out, my young mind started racing and in no time I was quite sure that whoever was in charge around there must have taken all the less-sighted people and shipped them off to Siberia or somewhere. I studied the crowd a little longer to make sure I wasn't imaging things and grabbed my friend's arm.

"Ed, did you notice no one around here is wearing glasses? What the hell do you think they do with all the people who have less than perfect vision?"

Ed probably said something snarky, because that's what he usually did and then proceeded to point out to me the many people sitting near us with glasses resting on their nose.

My theory was busted.

Tonight, I was out on a walk around the neighborhood when I came across not one, but two pair of prescription glasses lying on the ground near the sidewalk. I can't recall the last time I've seen a pair of glasses just laying on the ground. Immediately my mind started racing with the plot of a possible episode of The Twilight Zone. Were Martians in the area? Were they plucking innocent people from the earth as they walked to their cars?

Who knows, maybe it was the solar flares.