My dentist W

My dentist W

         W has been caring for my teeth for almost thirty years.  I had broken a large chunk off a molar.  Most dentists would have seen me to an oral surgeon to fet rid of the offending appendage.  W spent several hours rebuilding the tooth.  It is still functional.  W does good work.  He tries to relax me by playing oldies but goodies.  He is my age and likers the old songs.  He also shows me slides of his vacations.  For many years he had a dental assistant.  They fought constantly.

         “I’m going out for coffee now,” she announced each morning after being there only a half hour.]

         “No you’re not.  I need you.”

         “I’ll be back, she responded, walking out the door.

They fought so often I believed that they were married. Last year as his practice dwindled he let her go.

        W is a great dentist but he has one fault.  He is obsessive compulsive.  His cavity preparations, his crowns, his scaling and cleaning must be perfect.  It is not uncommon for him to spend two hours with me on the chair.  I named him “Dr. Relentless.”

         W is closing his office.  “My patients have all died,” he explained.  I am certain that I am his last patient.  My wife and children can’t understand why I stick with him.  Neither can I.  Last week I was in for my regular six month examination and cleaning.  Everything was fine.  We said our good-bys.  Two days later I broke a cusp on my lower right molar.  I wasn’t sure he’d see me.  But he did.  I knew I was in for it this time.

         After two hours he was still drilling.

         “What’s the matter? “ he asked.  “You seem tense.  Am I hurting you?”

         “No.”

        

         “Then I don’t understand why you are tense.”

         “W, you’ve been drilling my head for thirty minutes without a break.  There can’t be anything left of that tooth.”

         Now he was irritated.

         “That’s what I have to do.  I have a lot more to go.  I am whittling away at it.  Machining it.  I have to take off the thickness of the crown.”

         After another fifteen minutes he pushed the drill away.  He then spent hour tooling a temporary crown and fitting it.  "Tap, tap" (my teeth together).  The temporary crown will only be until the next appointment.

          After three hours in the chair:

         “Oh. oh, I see a small pocket of decay in the tooth next to it. That will have to be filled.”

         “W, you are not doing any more today.  Let me out of here.”

         “Maybe your next dentist will be faster than me.”

         “No doubt.”

         At this point my wife looked in.  She had been waiting to pick me up.  I had told her it would probably by a two hour visit.

         “I haven’t seen you wife in a long time,” W remarked.

(She had quit him after one visit twenty-five years ago.)

         “Neither have I, W.  Neither have I.”

(see also “One tooth less.”)

        

        

What's in a Name?

      Joyce never named the wrens.  She's named just about everything else in our yard.  Animals, trees, stray cats all have appelations.  Three receently planted pine trees on the hill are Sam, Sophie, and Burton, all after deceased loved ones.  Rosetta was the rabbit that fell into our egress well and was rescused and nursed by Joyce.  But not the wrens.

     Six years ago when I retired  for the third time my coworkers presented me with a large white birdhouse that we erected on the corner of our dwelling, within easy view of the side porch.  For three years it remained vacant.  In the spring of the fourth year two wrens moved in, presumeably a male and a female.  They had babies and we watched them learn to fly.  Once the newly hatched birds got stuck in the corner of our porch.  I was smart enought not to try to rescue them for fear that the mother woulkd abandon them.  The wrens returned the secoind year and had two broods befoire exiting the birdhouse in the early fall.  This year they returned in April.  We watched them industriously clean out last year's nest  and bring in sticks and straw to rebuild.  I left cuttings I had triummed from decorative grasses and these were accepted and used  by the birds.

     Joyce researched wrens on the web and learned that the male services several partners in different nests. He allows each female to chose which nest she will inhabit.  The are said to place spider eggs in the nest so that the spiders will eat the mites.  They are aggressive, destroying eggs in the nests of other birds.  Bluebirds will not build nests if there are wrens in the vacinity. It is said that the male. who perches himself on the top of the house and sings vociferously,  has over two thousand different songs. I find that hard to believe.  You can't always trust Wikopedia.

     it is now the first week in June and as yet we have seen no babies.   Perhaps it is because the potential parents remain nameless.  The babies may be bastards like Jon Snow in Game of Thrones.
But today I observed sometrhing. different.  Usually it is the male that makes repeated trips to and from the house to the nearby woods and brings back insects to fed the female while she sits on the eggs  This morning I noticed both male and female leaving the nest.  Have the baies arrived?  Should I be ready to pass out cigars? We shall soon see.

     Joyce and I are happy to see them in the spring and disappointed when they leave, without warning. They are like renters in our birdhouse (wrenters?).  We become accustomed to seeing them fly  in and out all summer.  They make themselves at home here. Yesterday the male flew into our open garage.  I must remember to rmind Joyce to give them a name (Aawren and Aawreness?).