I accidentally took out my contacts before I sat down to post, so now I'm wearing glasses for the first time in at least a year. Some people do look better with glasses — in fact a lot of people seem to, given the right frames — but I don't see how they can stand wearing them.

So here's the deal:

You have to clean your glasses with a special cloth so that you don't scratch them. Theoretically kleenex would suffice, but you can't use that because it sometimes rubs off on the glass. You can use your shirt, but it's less effective and some people consider this low class.

If you think about it at all, then you can constantly feel where the glasses touch your nose and behind your ears. This is especially irritating when it's cold out. Furthermore, usually the fit isn't perfect, and you have to push your glasses up from time to time so that they look right on you.

(At Lawrence we often adjusted invisible glasses to signify our geekiness. The hassle of real glasses notwithstanding, I still find the gesture charming.)

You also have to worry about losing your glasses, or breaking them as I did once while raking leaves. Moreover, eventually your frames will get outdated, or you'll get sick of them, and then you'll have to spend another half hour looking at various styles. Trying to decide how you want your face to look for the next few years.

Your glasses will fog up if it's too cold or steamy. When it's sunny, you can't wear sunglasses and see unless they're prescription sunglasses.

(Personally I think it's stupid to spend that much money on sunglasses, because they inevitably get lost or stolen.)

Glasses fall off, and you can't wear them at all for any number of different activities. Some of your best memories will be blurry. That might be what bothers me most about glasses: sometimes in order to do something really fun, you have to take them off. I've worn my contacts while swimming and tubing and the worst thing that could possibly happen there is that one comes out. Hasn't happened yet.

What's really bugging me at the moment is the reduced field of vision. My frames are constantly in sight, like the world's dumbest HUD, and if I want to focus on something outside of those brown circles, I actually have to swivel my head.

I couldn't wear contacts for many years — my eyes were too sensitive for the brands on the market — but now that I can, I don't understand why anyone is still wearing glasses. Glasses are great as a backup, or maybe for reading in bed if your vision isn't terribly bad, but if you have to wear something every day then I highly recommend getting contacts.

Contacts are awesome. The only cleaning they ever need is an overnight soak in a cheap saline solution, and in about a week you can learn to put them on in seconds, without help from a mirror. They occasionally fall out if you use the same pair for too long or if you let your eyes dry out, but unlike a lost pair of glasses, a lost soft contact is not a big deal. They come in little fluid-filled plastic containers, so it's not hard to have a ready-to-use backup on hand.

I can imagine glasses becoming formal, like that uncomfortable suit you only wear on very special occasions, but that's not the world we live in right now. If you're still wearing glasses just because they look good on you, I submit that your friends don't really care that much. Canes can look cool too, but we'd rather none of our friends had to use one.