It had to happen; I saw it coming. My teeth have been slowly crumbling and I’ve been letting them go, no dentist for this girl because who would pay? We may have socialized medicine in Canada, but dentistry is another thing. No pain, but this crack down the middle of my back tooth scares me with its potential for problems. Right now, it jiggles a bit when I tongue it, but those little wiggles cause twinges and make my gum bleed. It goes right down to the root, not just splitting off pieces like the others, which I have been letting go as the wind whistles through the leftover hole.

Fantasies of pliers and bloody extractions flash like ‘what ifs’ in my brainpan, but that’s not going to happen, sorry baby. Another solution must be sought, the whole mess complexificated by being only a few days from leaving for a week of eating and play with the women. Amid that feasting frenzy, my tooth will be further at risk (assuming it lasts that long). As I type, I feel twinges in other teeth which have waited their time to turn me into a writhing wreck on the rack of pain, excuse the melodrama, but this little momma is scared.

I want to run shrieking in circles, gulp ice cream with espresso, smoke joints, guzzle beer and all of the above, but instead I sit paralyzed at the screen, ticker tape words streaming through my fingertips, lightnings sparking in my veins and that broken tooth sitting like an untripped mine in the back of my mouth, right where I chew because there’s a previously broken one on the other side.

I would ask for help, and might, but the questions of who, and how much, and where do I go jangle like broken links of chain in my brain.

This is the split, the line down my middle between paralyzed victim and powerful creator of my world. Along this line am I fractured like this solid enamel, eroded by gooey sweets I force down my throat. My world might rot from the outside in, fall away in pieces as the peace I cry for and might die for (if that would solve anything) proves elusive, a carrot dangling forever in the forever-future, made of endless possibility and potential but never substance.

And all the while, the positive part of me tirelessly scans for solutions and will—I hope—present me with a good one once this panic has swelled and ebbed.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 6th, 2007 at 4:45 pm and is filed under about me. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.