“Give me a smile, let me see those pearlies.”
- Faith No More, 1989
“Smile, tho’ your heart is aching”
- Charlie Chaplin, 1934 / Turner/Parsons, 1954
(I had a post I prepared earlier, but seem to have misplaced it, so sorry, it’s back to the dentist for this one).
Okay, so I have been absent for a short while; you must excuse me, I’ve been distracted. And no, there hasn’t been a lot of smiling, at least since Tuesday afternoon.
From one hole to four, and we are not talking golf here. All four teeth earmarked for demise have now been removed, as per the Great Dental Reconstruction Odyssey. The third and fourth went on Tuesday. They were incisors, what I believe are called the upper left and right laterals – for non-dental enthusiasts, they’re the ones next to your two big front teeth, the ones Dracula chowed down with.
On the suggestion of a friend I decided to keep these two extracted teeth (who knows, the Tooth Fairy might make a reprisal?). Yow, talk about icebergs – there’s a lot more tooth under the gum than over it. It was a bit horrible to think about the size of the holes in my head, but at least it explained the remarkable bruises that have formed on the gum. I did think about posting a picture of them (teeth AND bruises) but as dear readers of the Chronicles are such an exclusive bunch I don’t want to lose any of you.
Given that the Odyssey is in large part driven by vanity, seeing yourself with two big gaping holes is quite confronting. No amount of self reassurance along the lines of, it will all be for the best, stops the creeping horrors. When I went in for the followup yesterday, the dental assistant joked, “You can say you’re from Gagebrook now!” (Gagebrook: Slobart suburb from beyond the Flannel Curtain. A place where the children set fire to the buses and and there was a siege the other month with two residents sitting on their roof throwing stones and other missiles at police. For comparison, see Punchbowl, Redfern, Sunshine, Moe – you get the idea.)
Yesterday I had the pleasure of having the gaps filled with a type of specialist dental putty. Dr W constructed two falsies which he has glued in place by cementing them to the two front teeth – sort of like the way you might spacfill a hole in the wall. The sensation of gunk smeared across my front four teeth is most unpleasant – rather like smearing chewing gum over them and then not being able to get it off. I can’t bite anything tougher than a sandwich, and in any case the spacfilled creations have no cutting edge. When I speak, I sound like a cross between Alan Searle and Liz Smiley, which is attracting some pretty strange looks from colleagues.
ARRRRGGGHH!! I just want to rip them off! But if I can just stand them until next Thursday, they’ll be replaced by a short-term orthodontic device… more to come on this thread, I promise. Or is that a threat?
3 comments:
I was getting worried, thought you might have died on the operating table! I feel your pain though, I cringed suitably reading that post. My teeth are steadily marching across my gums, slowly but surely forming more and more bizarre angles.
I should go to the dentist of course, but I'm holding out. I think the last time I went was about 1991 and it was decidedly unpleasant (if you think the high pitched whine of the regular drill is bad, you should try the vision blurring vibrations of an auger the dentist referred to only as the "slow drill").
Then he had this brilliant idea to remove a molar (well, it was coming out at 90 degrees to all the others anyway) which, he claimed, would allow the teeth behind it to shuffle along and make space for my wisdom teeth. Once the offending tooth was removed (insert image of dentist with one foot on my jaw, pulling for all he's worth here) the teeth behind it promptly fell over, leaving me with an amusing triangular shaped gap to fill with food for post meal entertainment.
Ah, dentists. I love the theiving sadistic bastards. I'd like a set of choppers like "Jaws" of James Bond fame.
Next time, include photos :-)
Cheers,
Ash
Oh Ash, I feel YOUR pain! I never realised the two lower extractions could have led to entire teeth collapse; shudder to think what might have happened.
You can see why I waited to come to a big(ish) city to get the serious work done.
If you're brave, I'll emai you the photos direct.
They didn't collapse exactly, think more along the lines of the leaning tower of Pisa but without the tourists.
I'm game mate, let's have at 'em. Do your worst ;-) You know what a train wreck my general appearance is, so I'll spare you any detail shots of my pearly whites (ok, "white" is drawing a pretty long bow...)
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