How long do your sunglasses typically last before you lose them, sit on them or update them as fashion dictates? Two years? Three if you’re lucky?
Try 10!
My combination of looking after things and avoiding spending money, has meant my recently retired ocular sun-wear lasted me an entire decade!
I bought the $30 Polaroid sunglasses from Target in early 2001, in preparation for the Sacred Heart College Middle School Year 9 golf camp.
The cultural impact of “The Matrix” was just starting to make its mark on the Adelaide discount fashion industry. This was a few years before the “over-sized” craze of the mid ’00s, and in hindsight there’s definitely something “New Millennium” about those sunglasses.
They certainly served me well.
Whether it be driving a 1986 Toyota Corolla…
Or driving a 2000 Toyota Corolla…
Those sunglasses were always, if not attached to my face, then certainly within reach.
But they weren’t just useful for driving. I wore those trusty sunglasses on many modes of transport, from Melbourne’s trams…
To South Australia’s fabulous public transport network…
Where ever there was sunlight, I was always prepared.
I had a lot of good times in those sunglasses… if you know what I mean 😉
From wandering around the Sydney Opera House…
Scamming free tickets to things…
And that time I almost fought in ‘Nam…
To working for the man…
To “working” for the man…
Accosting celebrities at airports…
Standing around in Port Adelaide for no reason…
And just wasting time with friends…
But the time to move on is now. Actually the time to move on was probably four years ago. Quite frankly, those sunglasses are kinda gross now. Those little plastic thingies that rest on my nose used to be see-through. Now they’re brown…
So they’ve been banished away to the back of my desk drawer, next to my Rubix Cube and that mini Red Bull some promo girl gave me last year that I still have for some reason.
My face now bears a new pair of sunglasses, which don’t actually look that much different and ironically, are themselves at least five years old…
When I was working at GameTraders Norwood in December 2005, some guy came in and left his – what I assume to be very expensive – Ray-Ban shades on the counter.
So I put them in the draw and after a week and no inquiries, claimed them as my own.
And since then they’ve been waiting in the wings for the moment I killed my primary pair. But curse my habit of not breaking or losing things! They sat in my drawer for FIVE YEARS!
Look out that window. You had your time. The future is our world, old sunglasses. The future is… our time.
Kind regards,
David M. Green
Look after your things. And don’t stare directly into the sun.
