Open Wide Please

Jim came home from the dentist today, after having some work done. His mouth stayed numb for hours afterward.

"Boy, he must be using some new stuff! That sucker is powerful!" In fact, Jim didn't even eat lunch because his lips were too numb.

I wonder if the dentist could shoot this stuff into MY gums like, say, every OTHER day, perhaps?

Jim had to get one of his old fillings replaced. It's going to be a sad day when that happens to me, 'cause I have a LOT of silver fillings. And they are back from when I was a kid.

I have a gap between my front teeth - not proud of it, but that's the facts. My mother used to reassure me that my teeth would eventually grow together. Okay, Ma, I'm soon to be 55, and they're yet to be touching, so exactly how LONG do I have to wait?

It seems the problem is that I am missing another adult tooth somewhere along the line that would have smooshed (I think that's the actual technical term, too) the two front teeth together. Damn! One dentist went so far as to tell me that it's because of my Mediterranean background that I'm missing a tooth. Really? Huh. Both my kids are missing a tooth, too, so I know it is hereditary, but I don't know who the heck I got it from.

I don't have a very good history with dentists. When I was a kid, I used to walk to the dentist every Saturday. He'd take one good look at my teeth and say, "Come back next week." He claimed I was too young for braces. Yeah, right. I was 13 years old and he STILL said that!

The only good thing about going to him was that he gave out good toys. I remember getting a plastic wiener dog that was cut in half, and each half was attached to a plastic case with a toothbrush inside. I didn't care about the toothbrush (obviously with all my fillings!), but I could stick the two pieces of the dog together and have one complete dog to play with!

When I was an adult I remember going to a dentist named Dr. Wiener. I actually think his name was pronounced "weener" and not "winer"! Well, Dr. Wiener may have looked experienced with his salt and pepper hair, but something tells me that he just recently got his license to practice.

I went directly from work to my appointment. I was wearing a dress. The first incident that caused me to wonder about the ole Doc was when he was using one of the tools and the cord came between my legs and started pulling my dress up. I kept pulling my dress back down with my hand.

Then when he started "buffing" my teeth with that bumpy, rubbery thing, he DROPPED it on my chest and it when flying all over the place while he tried to grab it.

Hey, wait a minute. Now that I'm typing this, it sounds like he was a dirty old dentist, doesn't it. Damn! I may have been young and naive at the time, but I was smart enough not to go back to him again!

Time moved on, I grew older, and my friend recommend these two dentists to me. One was more good looking that the other. I sat in the chair, glanced up in the drop-dead gorgeous dentist's blue eyes, and when he said, "Open wide", while he pushed the button to recline my chair, I thought, "Now we're talking!"

But that was a short lived affair. One day my then 10 year-old son jumped off a railing at school and chipped his front tooth. The nerve was exposed and he needed immediate attention. The cute dentists couldn't "fit us in", so we called around till we found someone who could, and have been going to that dentist for the past 20 years.

He may not be as cute as the other guys, but he and his office staff treat me with kid gloves on. I have a significant gag reflex, and can't stand any kind of cloth or cotton near or IN my mouth. Oh yeah, I'm a barrel of laughs. But all this info is written on my chart and they respect me and my phobias. Sure, after I leave they probably suck on some of that laughing gas and then make gagging noises and shove cotton in their mouths and mimic me, but what I don't know won't hurt me. La-la-la-la-la *sticking fingers in my ears*