Mother of Light: Lightbulb, can you pick up that piece of
lint.
Lightbulb: What piece of lint?
Mother of Light: The one right there!!
Lightbulb: Where?
Mother of Light: THERE!!
Lightbulb: Oh, I see it now. Sorry it was almost the same color.
Mother of Light: (sighs) Oh dear.
Remember that grandfather of mine, the glue that kept of
together? I forgot to mention that the man couldn’t barely see colors correctly
and was colorblind (or color vision deficient – a more accurate but strangely
also a term that’s more insulting to your intelligence). The mother of light
knew in the above moment when I was 6 that I too had color vision deficiency
(I’d just use CVD but that’s taken) just like her father had. This of course would
lead to fun times with eye doctors and the like:
Eye Doctor: OK, this is called the Ishihara test. You will
see a few circles made up of colored dots and we want you to tell us the number
you see in each circle. Ready, BEGIN!
Lightbulb: OK, twelve, a man with his child, a pair of
mismatched socks, an umbrella, an unknown number of dots..
Eye Doctor: Stop. Did you know you were colorblind?
Lightbulb: Yep!!
So I, the only one of fifteen grandkids that due to some odd
genetic marker that makes it possible only for me to have a 50% chance at
having color vision deficiency, managed to win the pick two of four gender
chromosomes lotto. I take comfort in the possibility my nephew could also have
color vision deficiency due to the same anomaly (provided my sister is a
carrier through my mother), or that my daughter’s sons have a 50% chance of
having it as well; but then again my daughter is only a year old and hopefully
won’t have kids until she’s thirty-something. I agree with my wife on something
at least.
Bottom line, there were no magic pills, contacts or special
glasses that could somehow help you distinguish colors as a normal individual
could – that is, until EnChroma came along!
OK, so they may not have been the first (debatable), but
they were the ones that became famous with their stylish glasses in all those
YouTube videos of men that were now distinguishing colors for the first time when
before they could never at all grasp them and each one on cue being moved to
tears by it. What man doesn’t enjoy a good cry now and then? I’m waiting for
your response.
So, this tiny company suddenly was overwhelmed with
requests. Color vision deficient people left and right finally could see the
color of those annoying traffic lights, see why rainbows were not fifty shades
of gray, or finally why everyone was so obsessed with skin color. OK, I
exaggerate a bit, I know the bottom red one is go. But now I would be able to
certainly see colors in a whole new perspective. So where are my glasses?
I reiterate this company is extremely overwhelmed – glasses
out of stock, slow to respond to status requests, people with color vision
deficiency left wondering if they too can experience the happiness that so many
seem to have displaying those gray shaded rainbows overlaying their pictures on
their Facebook profile. Will those with color vision deficiency win too?
All kidding aside, I understand EnChroma the reason for the delays
and that you did not see coming the overwhelming demand that you would have
once those videos went viral. You’re doing good work and I hope to get my pair
of glasses some point soon. I will though make a video when I do get them that
will be parodic in nature because, well, that’s who I am. Then maybe those dots
will actually be numbers and not some psychological exam that I didn’t pass
either. (DISCLAIMER: EnChroma does not say that you can pass a test for color
vision deficiency with their glasses; I was just trying to make a bad joke –
insert mild chuckle here).
Reinvent the Lightbulb 