Brittle as Kindling

Perhaps you recall back to August when B had to go to the dentist. He was nearly out of his mind with fear and I was doing my best to reassure him that things would be fine. There was nothing to be nervous about and novocaine can work wonders. I have had loads of dental work done over the past 30 years - caps, crowns, veneers, fillings, onlays, root canals, impacted wisdom teeth, and so on - and if I, the original scared baby, could handle it, he would do fine.

So someone tell me why I was in a near panic, sweating and trembling, when I had to go today to have an old filling removed and refilled and the corner of a broken tooth built back again. It didn't even hurt - the novocaine injection smarted a bit - burned and all that - but I had tears in my eyes when she was drilling. Maybe I was just anxious because it's been a lot of years since I've had dental work done or it was because my mind was on something else or maybe it's just because my hair has heinous roots and have a fierce need to go get my hair colored but I was as shaky and jittery as a junkie. When I left the dentist office and stood out on the street at the front door of my apartment building to get a breath of air (I live in the same building as my dentist office but it's a separate entrance), my legs were still quivering. Maybe it was the sound. The sound of the drilling and then the sound of her smoothing off the filling is torturous. Amnesty International should be aware of this sound.

I had to come home, lips numb and fat feeling, and have a nap. For two hours. I slept like a hibernating bear. I slept so deeply that when I woke up it was already dark outside and I couldn't figure out what time it was or what day it was and for a moment I wasn't even sure where I was. I thought briefly that I was in my brother's apartment.

And I'm still exhausted. My mouth has unnumbed or thawed or whatever it is you want to call it but I think all the anxiety has whipped my ass.