Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Pink

When I met Regina in 1993, I was a sly Casanova who easily wooed her with tales of growing up in Scott Valley. She swooned when I whispered in her ear tales of rat-batting and jumping from bridges. But Regina was still unsure.

"Is he 'The One?'" she asked, accidently out loud.

"Who are you talking about?" I asked, then shrugged and continued, "You ever touch your friend's eye when he had pink eye, just so you'd get it too?"

"Marry me now," she replied.

Okay, it's amazing she married me. And, yes, pink eye was always the perfect excuse to get sent home from school. It's great; you're highly contagious and yet you feel fine. You aren't even allowed near a school and you can hang out with all of your friends who gave you pink eye in the first place.

The thought of dealing with her first case of pink eye freaked Regina out a little. So, when Dylan came home with gummy eyes last week, I wondered how she'd react. Like any good mother, she picked out the eye goobers, washed Dylan's face, and gave her eye drops. In a couple of days Dylan was back to being her usual bright-eyed self. Sort of ...

Dylan has a problem leaving our cats alone. She especially loves Alfonso, the fuzziest one. "Fonzie's" tolerance for being in a head-lock lasts a few seconds shorter than the other three cats', and he usually lets Dylan know by dropping the kitty hammer on her face. Last week Dylan had a perfect paw print, complete with claw punctures, on her left cheek. Then came the pink eye, then round 2 with Alfonso. Kitty: 2, Dylan: 0. He put a perfect puncture-constellation around her pinked-up right eye. She looked like the Big-Dipper landed on her face, or that she had a bad copy of Mike Tyson's face tattoo. The wound below her eye (the North Star in her constellation) was the worst one and even turned into a small bruise.

Dylan's brown eyes had turned pink, and then black. We woke up every morning giving ourselves eye-checks. Regina dreaded the possibility of pink eye. To her, it's one step above head lice. I worried about Grady -- but apparently a huge appetite and loud flatulence is the best defense against gooey eyes. And me, I still secretly wished I'd contracted it so I could stay home from work without really being sick.