2300 Degrees of Gaze

There's something not quite right with Grandma Wang's eyes lately.

It's not that her presbyopia has worsened, but that her nearsightedness has skyrocketed to an unbelievable number—2300 degrees. The doctor pushed his glasses up his nose, the look in his eyes behind the lenses even more bewildered than Grandma Wang's: "This... this isn't scientific."

Grandma Wang, however, was quite calm. She shoved her phone screen close to her face, squinted, and swiped expertly with her finger: "Hey, what's so unscientific about it? I look at it every day, so of course, I'm looking at it 'deeply'."

Ever since her son bought her a smartphone, Grandma Wang has been hooked. Short videos, health articles, inspirational posts—she devoured them with relish, often staying up until two or three in the morning. Her son tried to劝 her several times, but Grandma Wang argued eloquently: "You young people can stay up late, so why can't us old folks? Besides, I'm learning, keeping up with the times!"

Her 2300-degree lenses were thicker than beer bottle bottoms. When Grandma Wang put them on, the world became distorted and comical. Streetlights looked like giant mushrooms in her eyes, cars like crawling beetles, and pedestrians like elongated, deformed shadows.

She continued to "swim" in the ocean of her phone every day, only now she saw things even more "clearly."

On the news, experts passionately urged everyone to put down their phones and return to reality. Grandma Wang laughed heartily: "This expert is so funny. What's so good about reality? Smog, traffic jams, arguments... How is it cleaner than what's on my phone?"

The comment section was filled with agreement: "Exactly, it's better on the phone, peaceful and quiet." "Experts just don't know what they're talking about."

Grandma Wang deeply agreed and gave it a like.

One day, Grandma Wang came across a "challenge" on a short video platform: walking a straight line blindfolded. She found it interesting, took off her glasses, and eagerly gave it a try.

She confidently took her first step, but bumped her head straight into the wall.

"Ouch!" Grandma Wang rubbed her head and muttered, "The people in the video walked so straight, how come I can't?"

She put her glasses back on and watched the video again. This time, she "saw" it clearly: although the people in the video were blindfolded, there was a faint white line on the ground beneath their feet, guiding their direction.

Grandma Wang suddenly understood. It wasn't that she couldn't walk straight, but that the world itself was crooked.

She took off her glasses and groped her way to the window. Outside, the night was deep, and the streetlights still looked like giant mushrooms, emitting a hazy glow.

Grandma Wang suddenly laughed, laughed until tears streamed down her face.

The next day, people in the neighborhood were buzzing with gossip.

"Have you heard? Grandma Wang has gone crazy."

"Yeah, late at night, not sleeping, she smashed all the appliances in her house."

"I heard she even threw away her phone."

"She's really gone senile. Why make a mess of a perfectly good life?"

Grandma Wang's son stood in the middle of the ravaged living room, picking up the shattered remains of the phone. A unread message still lingered on the screen:

"Mom, stop looking at that fake news, it's bad for your eyes."