The Evil Eye

Sometimes I don’t know which way to turn. I am lost and confused.

That’s because I’ve never been good at distinguishing right from wrong. I mean right from left. Like I said, I get confused.

I recall standing in front of my preschool teacher at age five, being quizzed on which was way left and which way was right. I could never remember, and it was devastating.

So, I wrote “R” and “L” on the tops of my shoes when no one was looking and stared straight down during quiz time. I got right and left correct, but I’m not so sure about right and wrong.

I’m better now, mostly, but the hardest part is looking at someone else and trying to remember that their left and right are mirror images of my own. It’s like doing long division in my head, or basic math for that matter – I have to draw it out first.

Which is a problem, because I’m a yoga teacher. I spend an hour or two each week telling a room full of people to move their left hand, right foot, left hip, right shoulder – nothing but left and right cues, delivered loudly, confidently, and in-the-moment. I get it wrong several times each class. I’ve given up on mirroring the group (demonstrating the opposite way so they will see the right way) – I look like a preschooler when I try.

“Just do whichever side you want. Then do the other side when we switch. And try not to fall down,” I say.

To make it more confusing, your body sends signals to the opposite side of your brain. If I’m using my right hand, it primarily fires my left brain. It’s true of the eyes, too – the left side of the eye communicates with the right brain hemisphere. So, if I’m looking at my right hand out of the right corner of my left eye…

Sorry, the fire alarm was going off. Smoke was pouring out of one of my ears. I don’t know which one.

It’s my eyes, though, that give me the most trouble.

My vision is awful. The world is soft and fuzzy, until I trip over something hard (I have the worst possible astigmatism). I wear contacts or glasses at all times. It’s been that way since third grade.

I wanted contacts so badly back then; I didn’t want to be four-eyes. And yes, to answer my son’s question, I was called four-eyes.

My mom took me to get fitted for contacts in the ninth grade, and the doctor insisted on putting them in for me. That optometrist stuck in his big finger into my eye to place the lens, despite my protests.

“No; I want to do it,” I said, but he didn’t listen. I punched him, hard. My mom frowned. I’d failed to distinguish right from left. I mean wrong.

Contacts taught me that with vanity, comes pain. That first week, I spent up to a half hour each morning before school getting them into my eyes – crying and blinking, determined. Good-bye, four-eyes. I’ve never looked back.

The other day, I was typing in my contact lens prescription, buying them online for the first time (less than half the price!), and I came across the terms “OS” and “OD.”

“OD” or Oculus Dexter, is the Latin name for your right eye, the good one, the chosen one. Oculus Dexter smiles, thinks of others, and always tells the truth. Oculus Dexter knows right from wrong, left from right.

“OS” is Oculus Sinister, your left eye, the Evil Eye. Oculus Sinister writes the quiz answers on her body, punches the optometrist, and makes her yoga students fall into each other.

Shame that I keep confusing the two.

by Jessi Waugh

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com