Man Who Used To Stare At Sun Now Mysteriously Blind

PHILADELPHIA, PA- Area man Rick Schefske, 43, who used to make it a point to stare at the sun for minutes at a time daily, has now mysteriously been declared legally blind in the middle of his life. "This comes as a surprise to me," said James Newfolk, PhD, who ran studies on the man. "Rarely do people go blind in the middle of their life for no reason."

According to his family, Schefske would routinely stare at the sun for minutes, sometimes even hours, on end. "He loved to admire the beauty of God's creation," his father, Ryan, said. "Especially by staring for hours on end at a bright heavenly body. It's too bad he won't be able to see the sun again. He loved to just sit there and stare."

"I remember one time when he was 7," his mother, Patricia, commented. "He had just ended another one of his going-out-and-staring-at-the-sun sessions, and he comes back inside and says, 'Mommy, I think my corneas are being directly melted out of my skull.' Ha! What a kidder."

Schefske said that before he went blind, he had had dark spots in his vision in the exact location where the sun had hit his line of sight. "Ever since I can remember, they had always been there," he said of the spots. "Whenever I turned away from the sun, it was like I was still looking at it. These spots were in the exact same spot that the sun had been in my line of vision. Also the same shape as I saw the sun. I remember thinking that was a strange coincidence."

When asked for their opinion on why their son went blind, Schefske's parents were clueless. "I really don't know," his father said. "I really don't know why he went blind. It's just kind of a mystery."

"My great-great-great grandfather was blind in his left eye," Patricia said. "Maybe that has something to do with it."

After extensive studies on the man, scientists suspect that his habit of openly gawking at the sun may have had some part in his going blind. "Basically, the only thing we can find, besides a weak genetic link, is his habit of just staring at the sun," Newfolk said. "But, honestly, we think it has more to do with genetics."

Although the cause has not yet been found, many scientists are warning against staring at the sun for the time being. "We think it may have a weak connection to blindness," said Dr. Evan McGregor, PhD, or Princeton University. "Although there would seem to be no clear link between sitting down and staring at a brightly burning heavenly body for hours at a time and eventual blindness later in life, we seem to have found a small connection. The public may want to hold off on the sun-gazing for now, while we research this."