Hurtling past 40, with a wife and two, I thought I might need dental work, and so contrived to see a dentist “on barter.”
The first visit was a long inspection. One dentist would pause and study the X ray, his stainless probe hanging loose in his hand like a chopstick. Target memorized, he would turn and begin to poke and pluck, until his head came up and he’d call out a number.
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Then there was the theory that when I got old and started losing teeth, I might want those wisdom teeth.
The dentists appeared suddenly like two actors from the wings, already bustling about as they said hello, calling me by my first name. One of them stuck a needle into the soft tissue above my tooth, and the area quickly grew numb.
For me, there was nothing to it: number 1 and number 16 went gently into that good night. The dentist worked quickly, first loosening ligaments, then commencing a slow, firm, circular tug, then moving abruptly into an intense, direct pull, his upper body tightening against me. Then he paused and stepped back.
“Make sure you get what you want and not what they want to get rid of.”
