Unfiltered Story #32806

In university, I sign up for an outing to an open-air museum. We get a guided tour of the place, which includes a herbal garden. The guide tells us about the uses for various plants, and comes to belladonna, or deadly nightshade.

Guide: “During the Renaissance, women used to use eyedrops with belladonna in it to dilate their pupils. Having large, dark pupils was considered beautiful back then.”

Classmate #1: “Oh, like (My name)’s eyes!”

Me: “Huh?”

Classmate #1: “You have really large pupils.”

Me: “I do?” (First time anybody’s told me this)

Classmate #2: “Yeah, you have huge pupils. When I first met you, I thought you were on drugs. But then I got to know you better and noticed your pupils are just always that large.”

Me: “Thanks very much. I assure you, I’m not on drugs.”

Classmate #3 (jokingly): “Sure (My name).”

Several people, including the guide, wanted to take a closer look at my eyes, and they all concluded I had unusually large pupils. Luckily, they did believe me when I said I wasn’t on drugs, due to my reputation as a straight arrow. But they did make jokes about my “belladonna-eyes” for some time after that.