Time has a curious quality of never stopping. Seasons pass, the days wind down, and the years accumulate. It is inevitable and we march on towards our fate always somehow three steps ahead of ourselves. The moment is never enough as we are constantly striving to plan, pressure and cajole a brighter future for ourselves. It seems one of the tenants of Zen Buddhism may have it right when it claims now is all we ever have.

It seems it is the small tells that let us know about times passage. Our bodies know the present very well — our minds may well be elsewhere, but our bodies are keenly aware of decrepitude. As the fourth and fifth decades come to fruition, one of the most common irritations in the blurring of vision.

The Greek word, presbyopia, carries with it a kind of ominous, tragic connotation. But the word simply translates as “old man eyes.” It is an adequate, if not sexist, description of the condition. Though this is not a serious condition, it is a very vexing one. There is nothing more irritating than having to hold a menu at arm’s length in a dim restaurant.

As Led Zeppelin put it: there two paths you can go by. The first is investing in a pair of bifocals or reading glasses. This will require some substantial trial and error phases as a pair of stylish reading glasses are few and far between. Indeed, even if you find a stylish pair, wearing them is as good as standing and proclaiming the march of time. A far more discrete solution is buying a pair of multifocal contact lenses. Like so-called normal contacts, multifocal lenses cover the entire iris, but whereas regular contacts affect your entire scope of vision, multifocal lenses will only bring items toward the bottom of your vision into focus.

Each pair is customized for an individual. This requires an appointment with a licensed optometrist. Once fitted, however, you can wear them all day, like normal contacts. They will have to be cleaned and soaked like normal contacts as well, though it is possible to have daily disposable multifocal lenses ordered on your behalf. Furthermore, like all soft-contact lenses, multifocal contact lenses are made from oxygen-permeable materials that allow the iris o receive vital oxygen.