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.”)