It was a nightmare for me. Some doctors had come to our school to conduct students’ eye check-up.

I had been to an optician earlier and he had advised me to start using spectacles but I had refused fearing my friends would make fun of me. Even my parents pestering and scolding had no effect.

I was a backbencher and had a lot of problems seeing what was written on the board, but neither did I shift to the front row nor did start wearing glasses.

But that day the doctors were in the school itself. There was no escaping for me anymore.

I was prescribed power glasses. My parents got me a pair. But I was loathe to wear them and them in my trousers’ pocket. And forgot. After changing I left the pants on my bed and my brother came to my room and sat on my bed — on the pants with the glasses in the pocket — and my glasses broke into a thousand pieces.

My parents were furious. But I was not to go to school without my spectacles. My dad got me a new pair. Initially I felt awkward and shy wearing them but now my spectacles have become an inseparable part of my life.