By Nous
                           
                           October 7,2002

"We will, we will rock you down, shake you up..."

The waiting room is completely silent except for the two children who,
on demand of the onlooking mother, are going through a cheerleading
routine - a boy and a girl - doing all of the hand and body motions and
afterwards, they critique each other on their performance.
"Would you like to be a cheerleader?" asks the ever-praising, overly-
adoring mother who had looked on with ceaseless pride, hoping, no doubt
that someone would see the children and congratulate her on raising two
little angels.
"Yes," replies the boy with that innocent lack of self-awareness.
"You know you'd be the only boy.  Would that bother you?"
"Cody says he wants to see what girls wear under their dresses." adds
the girl.  His sister, I assume.
A woman walks in with her son hoping to see the eye doctor that day.
The boy walks with feet facing in toward each other. His hands are bent
upwards, bunched up against his chest, wrists also bent.  Drooling, he
wanders back into the doctor's area and his mother has to call him 
back three times before he listens.
He is about fifteen to sixteen years old.
The back of his shirt reads, "Life....bring it on!"
A woman calls my name and leads me into the optometrist's office.
"The doctor will be with you shortly."
Obviously a worn out sentence for her.  There isn't a tone to it.  She
doesnt even look at me when she says it, but at the floor, in a searing
look of self-defeat.
I had listened to her conversation with her co-worker.  They had spoken
about their family members and where they worked, or where they wanted
to work, or where they were going to work. 
They had sold themselves to that lifestyle.  Someday, something better
would come along.
In the doctor's office, the roof is caving in.  The doctor peers into
my eyes.  It always makes me want to start laughing and run out of the
room.
It is no better when, as he is explaining a problem with my eye to me, 
he invites my mom to "take a look through the microscope, its really 
quite fascinating."
I cant stop smiling until they are both finally through shining the 
light in my eye.
Still, the intrusion is only mandatory for doing his job.  He is one of
my favorite optometrists.
He tells jokes and not only does he never smile at them, but looks 
dead serious having told one.  His fingernails are always incredibly 
trim and clean. His eyelashes are slightly curly and his voice is calm.  
The kind of voice that you'd hear coming from a scientist on the History
Channel.
He explains to my mom that he doesnt even have to dilate my eyes because
he can see everything without it.
"I mean, look at his eyeballs.  They're huge.  If I dilated yours right
now, they might be as big as his."
My mom feigns shock, perhaps not understanding what he just said.
He doesnt use jargon.  And when he does, he always has a plastic model
of the eye to go through the explanation.
"His eyes look wonderful.  They're extraordinary."
Leaving the eye doctor, my mom and I walk across the parking lot trying
to figure out where we parked.
I step in a large puddle of water and accidentally soak my jeans.  I 
look down and frown. A man walking past me, having seen me soak my leg, 
laughs in a low, soothing tone and says, "Autumn's coming."
I dont know what he means.