I WAS WIGGLING out of control in the narrowest Dentist’s chair I’ve ever been crammed into.
He was just too doggone cheerful when he said the six words you never want to hear: ”This may sting just a bit.”
This — May — Sting — Just — A — Bit.
His statement got my usual response — I started bawling like a baby.
Because, you see, I am a blubbering baby anytime I get within 5 blocks of a Dentist’s office.
In this case, it was an Endodendododontist’s office. (Just in case you haven’t noticed, I am purposely capitalizing Dentist and Endodontist in hopes of impressing them favorably and making them like me better.)
Question:
Do you know how to tell the difference between a Dentist and an Endodontist?
Answer:
You take the Dentist’s fee, double it, and put that figure in front of a zero.
“Stop blubbering or I’ll REALLY hurt you,” the Endo said. He flexed the muscle under his ‘Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club – Texarkana’ tattoo to show me he wasn’t kidding.
I was visiting this teenage Specialty Dentist because I had a tooth problem in a real, real, real difficult place. I mean, the offending tooth was so remote it almost wasn’t in my mouth at all. My usual Dentist had decided to send me off to see the teenage Endodontist because, frankly, he was tired of hearing me bawl like a baby.
I had ignored my dental problem until I got an abscess. Then, I had to take penicillin until I could get in to see the Endo.
Endo’s office assistant, obviously recently released from Angola Prison, took pains to politely inform me of Endo’s fees, and said that if I promised to capitalize Endodendodontist every time I used the word he would give me Green Stamps and lie to my regular Dentist by saying that I had behaved bravely.
So, there I am, bawling like a baby in Endo’s chair. He gets Nurse Ratchet, a stout former lady wrestler, to hand him the horse syringe full of painkiller. It takes both hands to handle the loaded whopper syringe.
“Hold him down,” he instructed Nurse Ratchet. She put me in a Full Nelson (that’s what us professional wrestling fans call a debilitating wrestling ‘hold’) and she bit my ear just like veterinarians do when they medicate a reluctant mule.
I’m telling you, I couldn’t move. Even when I felt ‘that little sting.’
The Endo hid behind a surgical mask and stuck a piece of wood between my teeth.
•Where are you from, he asked? (These guys always want to talk, don’t they?)
Mumpfa gwabda gokka, I answered.
•How old are you, he asked?
Blakicna kyukit fawba, I answered.
•Really, you don’t look kyukit fawba at all, he said.
It was my turn to ask him a question.
•Micvar pwamma wobba?
Lewisville, he said.
Time flies when you’re having fun (A cute saying I just made up).
Nurse Ratchet bundled me into a wheelchair and rolled me up to the receptionist’s cage where I was expected to pay for this joyous experience.
“It’s gonna cost you double your usual Dentist’s fee plus an extra zero, and we take credit cards,” the receptionist said.
She took my card and swiped it. Handed it back along with the slip I was supposed to sign.
“Waaaay justuh minna,” is what I managed to croak through novacaine lips. “There’s no place to add a tip.”
Well, I thought that was funny even if you didn’t.
The receptionist didn’t think it was funny either. She had Nurse Ratchet push the wheelchair outside and dump me by the door of my buggy in the parking lot.
What else can happen? I foolishly asked myself.
It began to rain, and I noticed a parking ticket under my windshield wiper. And I had another flat tire.
Shut my sore mouth.
I really, really hate that the Endodendodontist’s Harley was getting wet. It still hurts to laugh.
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THINGS I LEARNED from opening email: A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.
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WORD GAMES. The twins: Height and Width. Often joined by their cousin Depth. Sometimes they get sassy and speak only in metric, and I don’t have the faintest idea what they’re saying.
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HE SAID: “Social media websites are no longer performing an envisaged function of creating a positive communication link among friends, family and professionals. It is a veritable battleground, where insults fly from the human quiver, damaging lives, destroying self-esteem and a person’s sense of self-worth.” Anthony Carmona, president of Trinidad and Tobago
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SHE SAID: “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” Harriet Beecher Stowe, abolitionist and author
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SWEET DREAMS, Baby
