Ready

One of my eyes is significantly higher on my face than the other.

When I say significantly, I mean noticeably, though certainly not exaggeratedly so. You probably wouldn't notice unless it was directly pointed out to you.

It was a truth unacknowledged by even me until I was 15. And then it was addressed, casually, by a boy, as a curiosity which he realized presently was perhaps tactless to mention. I bore it with whatever grace teenage girls can muster.

I have poor eyesight. Bad enough that my glasses act as tilt-a-whirls for those who look cavalierly through them. The combination of my eyesight and my eye slight has been a cause of concern. All of my frames, corrective and sun variety, look uneven, crooked.

"Did your glasses get bent?"

"No," strained, good-natured tone, "that's just my face."

I am particularly fond of the theory that as I was exiting the birth canal, my face was compressed, gnarled, briefly twisted as I attempted to shoot myself forth. I've never been a fan of tight spaces. I was born a little early. Not out of ambition, I'm guessing, but as befits my demeanor, simple impatience and carelessness.

Damn the consequences, when I'm ready, I'm ready. And I am almost never ready, but when I am, every one and everything better catch up. If the nail polish hasn't set, I'll smudge it because I am ready to move. If the clothes haven't dried, I'll wear them damp because I am ready to leave. If the pasta isn't cooked, I will chomp away because I am ready to eat.

There are things that I seem to never be ready to do. I'm never ready to get a better job, finish school, or pay my bills early. There are tasks and rituals that I never start until it's too late to correctly execute them.

But once in awhile, the urge to act is so strong that I do so thoughtlessly. Urgency compels me, my animal instincts shout down the voices of the better angels in my head, and sometimes I end up with half-baked, half-assed attempts.

Sometimes I end up with one eye higher than the other. Well, my vision would have been bad either way.