I was 15 when I got my first pair of glasses. At first I wore them mainly for reading. Then I started wearing them more often at school and finally for watching television and driving. In my early 20s, I finally accepted the fact that I had to wear them all the time. I spent most of my work day in front of a computer and although the screen was just a few inches away, things were much clearer with my glasses on.

One of my sisters started wearing glasses in third grade and had Lasik eye surgery a few years ago. For the first time in about 20 years she was able to see without glasses. Now that I've been depending on glasses for almost 20 years, I'm thinking that it might be nice to wake up in the morning and be able to read the alarm clock or to go to a swimming pool and not have to wear glasses in the water to make out which kids are mine.

Since I'm still a little leery about the whole thing, I thought that this column would give me a good opportunity to hear from others about their experiences with the procedure. So, if you're someone who's had the surgery and would like to share your experience, good or bad, e-mail me at csteinw@yahoo.com and fill me in.

Tell me how you met your spouse

Recently my dad suggested that I write a column on how different married couples have met their spouses. I liked idea since I'm always interested in hearing how couples have met.

My dad mentioned that the son of a friend of theirs met his wife while jogging in New Zealand and my sister's best friend since age 14 is getting married later this year to a co-worker of my sister.

When I think about other couples I know, there are several who have met in high school or college, been introduced by friends or married co-workers. Others met in more unusual ways. My niece, who married last year and moved from Lansing to Australia, met her husband, a native of Queensland, while they were both teaching in Japan. My sister met her husband at a Cubs spring training game in Arizona after a conversation with his grandmother and mother who were seated in the row in front of her. My former neighbor met her husband of about 60 years at a neighborhood baseball game in the Roseland area. Another couple I can think of met when she was a waitress at a restaurant he frequented. Another when a college student met a foreign exchange student and showed him around campus. A high school friend married her brother-in-law's brother, so there were two sisters married to two brothers.

If you'd like to share the story about how you met your spouse for me to include in a future column, e-mail me at csteinw@yahoo.com.

The opinions are solely those of the writer.