It can be a nuisance being stopped every time I step onto the streets, but it is expected by those who choose to wear two monocles, like me. Why, the curious strangers would ask, do I not just wear glasses like everybody else?

One reason is that bifocals, while convenient in that they can be handled with one hand, are notoriously inflexible. If I put them on, yes, my sight rivals that of an eagle, and if I take them off, it is the same except now the eagle is asleep. But what about those special occasions when I want a mere average of the two? If I want to look into my long-lost lover’s eyes under soft focus while violin music swells up in the background, all I need to do is remove one monocle (and turn on the stereo). If I begin to tell a story about my past, and would like to make my world progressively blurry so as to cue a flashback, I can do the same. And if I meet a beautiful young lady whose only flaw is a tiny scar on her cheek, I can easily remove it by applying my own low-tech Gaussian blur. Bifocals offer no such freedom.

Another reason is that ladies love monocles. They tell me it reminds them of days past when men were gentlemen—educated, classy, and wearing monocles—when men still opened doors for their ladies because women did not yet earn the right to do so themselves, and when men still kept a respectable distance before marriage because the black plague was annoyingly contagious. In short, I suppose the monocle is a mark of sophistication, the kind that is nearly extinct in today’s fast-paced, selfish world. And if double the monocles, then surely, double the sophistication.

To be quite candid, there is a third monocle adorned somewhere else on my body, but few get the privilege of seeing how sophisticated I really am.