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| The BBHQ Boomer Essays: |
| Our Boomer-In-Charge here at BBHQ, Hershel Chicowitz, writes frequently about current events... from a boomer perspective. He is sometimes funny, sometimes provocative, sometimes a little of each. We hope you get a kick out of our Boomer Essays. |
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In the category of "be careful what you wish for...," I was just saying the other day that I would rather spend an afternoon writhing in pain in the dentist's chair than hear another word about Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton. Sure enough, the next day my dentist informed me that my lower, right wisdom tooth had to come out.
This surprised me; I thought I had liberated all my wisdom teeth when I was a teenager...... Things were indeed so much simpler then. That summer in the late 60's I was working in the food service area at the local swimming pool. We fixed and filled vending machines and kept the place clean. (Read about it in "The Days of Summers Past.") There were only a few days when the temperature went over 80 degrees in Cleveland, and this particular day was destined to be a scorcher. I was scheduled to work the 1-9 shift. But I had a 10 o'clock appointment to have a tooth removed. I remember that I had novocaine, but I can still hear the sound of the tooth crackling as it reluctantly gave up its comfortable seat in the rear of my mouth. The sound was worse than the pain. But afterwards, with my mouth swollen and full of bloody gauze, I put on my Variety Vending T-shirt and headed over to the pool. I had work to do.
"When duty whispers low, 'thou must'; the youth replies: 'I can.'" (High school poetry... I don't remember the author.)
Anyway, I was OK as long as I did not have to bend over, and didn't have to talk. It was not worth the effort to explain why I could not talk right... especially when... I could not talk right. So I just nodded my head a lot, and tried to do my job. Weatherman Dick Goddard was right; it was hot as blazes.
Ron Silver, owner of Variety Vending and watchdog of the food service area, was a taskmaster to end all. If you looked the wrong way, he let you know about it. It was not at all unusual to get yelled at half a dozen times a day. But his bark was far worse than his bite. He never fired anybody; the faint of heart quit long before he had a chance.
So it didn't surprise me when Ron yelled at me in spite of my delicate condition. "Thunder," he barked. (My nickname was "Thunder" - it's a long story.) "Get over there!" "Thunder; pick up that paper." I was used to it... I just did my job and kept my mouth shut. I needed the buck-thirty-five an hour I was making. The novocaine was still doing it's job; I really felt OK.
But that was not good enough for Ron. I remember him calling me over and ordering me to "talk to the customers." I mumbled something back to him, but he just pointed to "the floor," and ordered me to get back out there.
So it was especially surprising when he called me over in the middle of a rush and gently told me to take a few minutes off. "Go in the back and wash your hands and face. Sit down and rest for a while." Huh?? It was only when I went into the back and looked in a mirror that I realized there was a stream of blood trickling down out of the corner of my mouth.
Ah, those were the simpler days of my youth. This time the dentist warned me that "this may hurt just a little bit." He called it a surgical extraction of the lower, right wisdom tooth. I thought of it as an amputation of a loyal and long-time body appendage. I know this was no John Wayne Bobbit deal; but still, I had carried this tooth around for nearly half a century. Doesn't loyalty count for anything? I guess not.
My dentist's office is just down the road from University Hospital in Tampa. You may recall that that is the infamous place where a doctor cut off the wrong leg of a diabetes patient a few years ago. Now, my dentist has no affiliation with that hospital, but I was taking no chances. I walked into his office with the words "WRONG SIDE" painted on the left side of my face. And just to make sure, I also painted the word "NO" on both arms and legs. And I guess he did not find it amusing when I asked him how many patients he had lost while extracting a tooth. I thought it was a perfectly reasonable inquiry.
My dentist has always taken precautions; it only makes sense. However, this is the first time I recall him using arm and leg restraints on me. Suddenly I realized that this was going to be a big deal. Fortunately, as he shot me up with novocaine and I began to go numb, my favorite music was playing in the background. It was one of those frequent flashbacks to the sixties:
"I see... a bad moon rising
I see... trouble on the way
I see... earthquakes and lightnin'
I see... bad times today."
I actually felt very little pain, and I didn't hear the much dreaded sound of my roots letting go of the tight grip on my jaw. The dentist had apparently decided on a different approach. "Nurse, let me have the Patriot missile bit, please." He was going to drill it into submission. Apparently there was not enough tooth left for him to pull it, so he had to drill it out.
"You got to know when to hold 'em;
know when to fold 'em.
Know when to walk away,
and know when to run."
Believe me, I felt like running.
"Well, that's half of it," he said confidently, as he drew his hands out of my mouth and paused. Half of it? He cut it in half? Not feeling comfortable with the silence, and reaching as far as I could for some comic relief, I managed to mumble, "Well I guess that means we won't be able to put a bracket on it and use it as a key chain."
Nothing. Not a thing. It was as if I had said absolutely nothing. He just went back to work on the other half. But about 90 seconds later, he said, very matter-of-factly, "No, we won't be able to make a key chain out of this," and went on with his work.
So much for his sense of humor.
"Cause every hand's a winner
And every hand's a loser
And the best you can hope for is to die in your sleep."
Yeah, but with arm and leg restraints strapped to your body?
"Don't you know that it... hurts so bad;
it makes me feel so sad...."
I have been going to this dentist for nearly a quarter of a century; he really is terrific, in spite of my complaints. And if he does not have a sense of humor, his office manager proved that she does. I had a friend drive me this time, and while I was losing a tooth, the manager walked out to the waiting room and said, "This is not going particularly well; it may take a little longer than we expected. Are you a close friend or relative of the patient?"
But in about an hour, it was all over... all but the recovery. No, I was not up for an afternoon of work this time. I went straight home and to bed. Besides, the words "WRONG SIDE" were still emblazoned on my left cheek.
On the way home, the pain began to set in, but music was will running through my mind. I thought of how I might be able to write about the experience. With apologies to Dion and the Belmonts, I penned this:
"Here's my story...
it's sad but true;
'bout a tooth, I used to chew.
It had to go, 'cause it went bad.
and left me feeling... oh, so sad.
Hurt, hurt;
w-ooo-ooo-oh;
hurt, hurt.
w-ooo-ooo-oh;
hurt, hurt.
w-ooo-ooo-oh; hurt!
Ahhhhhhhh..."
Yeah, that captured the moment. Fortunately, that is as far as I went with it. Twelve hours later I was hungry, but the thought of chewing food was downright scary. Nope, not yet. So what's a guy to do? Well, I'll bet you didn't know that you can suck a McDonald's french fry straight through a thick, plastic straw, did you? "We are motivated by inspiration or desperation." I don't know which this was. Actually, it didn't taste half bad.
Well, it is five days later, and I am only now getting back to normal. But I learned the hard way that one good sneeze wipes out three days of healing.
So I guess it's true that you heal faster when you are young. But I'd like to think I was a bit wiser this time; no blood trickled out of my mouth - at least, not that I am aware of. And I can tell you this for sure: the next tooth of mine that is amputated will be removed over my cold, hard, dead body.
Don't hold your breath.
"And somewhere in the night,
the gambler, he broke even.
But in his final words I found
and ace that I could keep."
Remember, kids: brush and floss after every meal.
OK, OK:
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So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man, When Duty whispers low, Thou must, The youth replies, I can! - "Voluntaries," Ralph Waldo Emerson |
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If you like what we're doing here at BBHQ, please help us by buying stuff through our link to Amazon.com:
| The BBHQ Album of the Month is "Old Friends Live on Stage (Deluxe Edition) (2 CD/1 DVD)," by Simon & Garfunkel. If you were fortunate enough to see them in concert last year, I do not have to sell you. The concert was terrific! This album collection includes 55 songs, plus their new recording, "Citizen of the Planet," and one of the songs sung by the Everly Brothers during the concert. The DVD was recorded during their concert in Madison Square Garden in 2003. For any S&G fan, this is a must have! But then, you knew that already, didn't you? |
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The BBHQ Book of the Month is
"Vinyl Highway," by
Dee Dee Phelps. You remember her as Dee Dee, of Dick and Dee Dee.
Together, they took a decade long ride on the rock and roll roller
coaster. It was a heck of a ride! Dick Clark, Quincy Jones, the Beach
Boys, Glenn Campbell, Dionne Warwick, Bobby Vinton... Dick and Dee Dee
rubbed shoulders with all of them. This is her "behind the scenes" story.
It's pretty cool.
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