April 8, 2002
DOWN HOME:
He can get out of the car now
___This story starts with the singular sound of sunglasses scratching on stone.
___My old sunglasses were terrific. OK, the frames had been scratched, but the lenses were perfect. And they had spring-action temples, which made them the most comfortable glasses I've ever worn.
___But glasses make an absolutely awful sound when you step on them, and I figured before I ever lifted my right foot that these sunglasses were ruined.
___That's not good, especially if you drive practically anywhere in Texas. That big, beautiful sun gives us gorgeous days. But it also plays havoc with the ol' eyeballs, especially when its glare caroms off bumpers, crashes through your windshield and creams your corneas.
MARV KNOX
Editor
___On the way home that afternoon, I tried to look around the scratches on my lenses. I might as well have tried looking around baseballs hanging from my eyebrows.
___Undeterred, I rummaged in my sock drawer and found an old pair of teardrop-shaped aviator sunglasses I've owned since early in the first Bush administration. They looked good to me, so I breathed on them, wiped them with a clean handkerchief and put them in the car.
___All was well until someone from my family actually rode in the car with me. You would have thought I was prancing in front of the Texas Legislature in an Elvis costume with a pink feather boa. Or worse.
___The consensus from Joanna, Lindsay and Molly was that those old sunglasses made me look like a deputy sheriff from LA--lower Alabama. Either that, or a 1970s CIA operative who just thawed out from the Cold War.
___I soon learned I had been mistaken my whole life. See, I always thought sunglasses were about the lenses and protecting your eyes from dangerous ultraviolet rays. Not true. Sunglasses are about the frames and looking acceptable before decent society.
___Jo and the girls allowed me to wear my old (unbroken) sunglasses while driving, but they forbade me from keeping them on outside the car. Have you ever noticed how bright the sun is when you get out of church on Sunday?
___Soon, our priority became finding acceptable sunglasses. The first pair started falling apart before I took the tags off. The second pair fit too close to my face and fogged over. But the third pair made me look "very 'Men in Black-ish,'" according to Molly. I kept them, since I covet any favorable physical comparison to Tommy Lee Jones.
___Now I can get out of the car in the sunshine without risking embarrassment to my family.
___Sometime during that search for sunglasses, I wondered what would happen if Christians cared as much about reflecting the gospel as we do about our own reflections in the mirror. Then the light of our Savior might bring sight to even the blindest spirits.
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