But after 67 years spent peering down a microscope lens, Geoff Dobson is used to seeing things a bit differently.
The 79-year-old, of Stafford Parade, Skircoat Green, Halifax has been obsessed with microscopes since he was first given one from a Halifax toyshop as a 12-year-old boy.
In the years since, Geoff has taught the skill at Calderdale College, helped analyse slides from the former Royal Halifax Infirmary and added two-high-powered models to his collection.
"My microscopes are my babies," the retired engineer said. "They are my love and you see things that an everyday man doesn't see.
"It is a lifetime's passion and I have always been completely dedicated to it.
"When I was younger I was looking at butter, hair, anything I could lay my hands on really.
"There are some things, the most everyday objects, that become something else entirely when you put them under a lens.
"It is another life completely and can be just incredible.
"I'm so happy to have seen some of the things I have seen, you would be amazed what things are down there."
Geoff has also rigged up cameras to his two microscopes so that he can photograph the amazing and sometimes eerie images that have passed under his nose over the years.
He has also prepared many of the delicate slides himself, a painstaking process that can go wrong at the slip of a hand.
Some of Geoff's close-up shots include a fly, tape worm, daddy long legs and parasites.
"My absolute favourite is a bowl of water I keep out in the garden though. I put hedge clippings in there and leave them to rot and it becomes like another world."
Geoff says microscoping is lonely work, but Rita, his wife of 18 years, does not seem to mind.
"My wife understands I have to be dedicated in what I am doing but she isn't interested in it at all," he said.
"I have one microscope in the kitchen and one in our bedroom and I have spent whole evenings looking at them.
"But Rita just watches TV when I'm doing it and I hate TV, so we are both happy."
Geoff is dedicating both his microscopes to nearby Crossley Heath School, when he is no longer able to use them.