THE WEEKEND I GOT NEW EYES.

AUDIO QUACK (skip intro 2:46)

I discovered I needed glasses at the back of chemistry class when I was 13. I thought the teacher’s whiteboard pen was running out, but it wasn’t the pen—it was me. By the time I was in my 30s, my prescription had gone to -5, which meant the world looked like an impressionist painting.

I’ve relied on contact lenses to see, which has been fine for the day-to-day, but if there was a Noah’s Ark flood, then I’m screwed. I thought about that a lot.

So I decided to get laser eye surgery.

Dad was the designated nurse for the occasion. He accompanied me to the surgery, and the plan was to have a peaceful weekend in his flat as I recovered. That was the plan.

When I left the surgery room, I could kind of see Dad in reception, waiting for me. I say kind of…I was so sensitive to light that it was like trying to keep my eyes open after five sleepless days. However, between the flicker of my eyelids, he was there, smiling.

The flat had just been moved into, and towers of cardboard boxes and deliveries of John Lewis furniture were ready to be unpacked. I crawled into the guest bed in a large Iron Maiden t-shirt and Ray Bans; I was about to press play on my audiobook when I heard noise from the hallway.

My heart sank.

“A1 to fit into C1…” Dad said to himself. I knew, even with my eyes closed, he was attempting to build the John Lewis trolley.

“Leave it! I will do it when I can see again!” I shouted from the bed. I then pressed play and drifted off to sleep.

When I woke again, Dad had given himself the new task of setting up the sound system.

“ALEXA!” he yelled from the edge of my bed. “PLAY BRUCE SPRINGSTEIN.”

Alexa replied, “hmm let’s try again, say add milk to my shopping list.”

“ALEXA STOP. PLAY BRUCE SPRINGSTEIN.”

“Ok, playing Bruce Springsteen…”

Dancing in the Dark filled the room, and I groaned into my pillow. The sound system task was more successful than the trolly task. Alexa soon worked in the guest room, his room, and the hallway. Google claimed the living room.

“Just don’t say the wrong name in the wrong room,” Dad whispered as if the smart speakers were mistresses who would be horrified if instructed by the wrong name.

“Alexa? Who the hell is Alexa?!”

The next morning, when I opened my eyes, I could see clearly for the first time in seventeen years. Unfortunately, the first thing I saw was the cast of Only Fools and Horses smiling back at me in a framed photo.

We went back to Parson’s Green for a follow-up appointment. A few blood vessels had EXPLODED (dramatic verb), which was why my left eye looked like a strawberry and cream sweet. And I couldn’t quite read the last line of the letters; is it a G or C? But my eyes were on their way to being eyes again. All I had to do was keep resting.

That afternoon, Dad went off to watch the football in a pub, and Hermione popped in for a visit. We were hungry, so I served up some hummus with my GAIL’S sough dough loaf. (Don’t judge me; I deserved overpriced bread after having my eyeball cut).

Chatting, laughing, slicing with blurred vision…What could go wrong?

Next thing, Hermione and I are rushing down Oxford Street with blood GUSHING (dramatic verb) from my finger. At this point, my brain probably thought I was being lightly tortured this weekend. We went to Boots pharmacy, where they bundled up my finger in a huge white bandage.

Hermione, who had recently done a First Aid course, advised that I should go to A&E in case I get sepsis. I rang Nurse Dad and told him my plan to go to St Thomas’ Hospital. He advised, from the bar stool, that I shouldn’t go. “There are no organs in your fingers, Mary. You’ll be fine.”

And to be fair, I’m here, alive, writing the Quack in Dad’s flat. My left index finger is poorly plastered up. (Unlike Hermione, I haven’t done a first aid course for a while). Behind me, LBC is blasting out of Alexa. I mean Google. Crap.

And in the kitchen, there is the John Lewis trolley, built by me, where a fresh new GAIL’S loaf sits.