anticipation/your eyes can play tricks

I went to Wal-Mart at lunch to get a Pretzels Plus pretzel. While I was sitting in the car, savoring its buttery goodness, I glanced up to see that the shopping center across the street had installed lovely blue awnings. Only, they hadn't.


As you can see, and as I realized, what I thought were awnings across the street were actually the banners above the Wal-Mart cart returns. When you lack depth perception and have not enough visual context clues (or in this case, perhaps too much to visually digest), your eyes can certainly play tricks on you.

I started this blog to chronicle my experiences with vision therapy. I am getting my consultation with the vision therapist tonight. I was inspired to try vision therapy by Susan Barry, who wrote the book Fixing my Gaze: A Scientist's Journey into Seeing in Three Dimensions. I will detail more about my self and my condition as we go on, but I was born with a condition called strabismus and had nine surgeries from infancy through my teenage years to correct it. While aesthetically, they did a great job, I cannot see in 3D. I never thought it was possible, but after reading Barry's book, I think that through vision therapy, I might be able to train my eyes to work together and attain normal vision. I am anxious and nervous and excited about the appointment tonight. Visiting the eye doctor has always been a huge source of anxiety for me and this is no exception; however I've never felt such hope about the potential outcome. Let's hope she says I'm a good candidate for vision therapy!