Talk Like a Pirate Day
I have a secret. I was saving it for the next time I play "Two Truths and a Lie," but will instead let the cat out of the bag now. When I was in high school, a boy-who-I-had-a-crush-on hit me in the face during a game of Ultimate Frisbee and knocked my right front tooth loose. He felt horrible.
It was a Sunday afternoon, but our dentist, a family friend, made a special trip to meet me at his office to cement my tooth back in place. Eventually, I had a root canal. Talk of crowning the tooth was tossed around (which terrified me), but in the end, we left it au naturale, with the warning that some day the tooth, now completely dead, may discolor or chip.
Fast-forward 7 years or so and that little guy was still going strong (wedding pictures, still my real tooth). Last summer, however, I decided that I better deal with the situation on my own terms, before any real crisis should arrive, and while Obama Care still had me on my parents' insurance. I was still nervous about the whole process - I mean, who really wants a fake front tooth? - but by the recommendation of my new husband, who had the same procedure done on one of his own pearly whites, I bit the bullet. Our FANTASTIC dentist, Dr. Karla Solis, made a carbon copy of my original tooth and even had it hand painted to match the rest of my grill. After sanding down the original to a nub, she cemented that puppy in place and I have been faking you all ever since.
Last night, we had a bit of a dental crisis in the Storrs household. While flossing - and I want to state for the record that I am a gentle flosser with sensitive gums - my crown popped itself right out of place. Panic surged through my veins as I looked at the mix of spit and blood and porcelain in my hand. I could shove it back in place with some success, but the crown was obviously loose and threatened to escape with the slightest jaw jostle or touch of the tongue. And so, there I stood, exposed for the scraggle-toothed circus freak I was. I managed to stammer to Phil what had just happened and he came running to my aid. Fearing his adverse reaction, I clasped my hand tightly over my mouth. Would he laugh? Would he run? These all seemed viable options because in my mind, I looked like this:
While in reality, and as Phil oh-so-gently reminded me, I looked exactly like I do every other night, except one of my teeth was in the palm of my hand instead of stuck up in my gums where it belongs. No receding gum line, no instantaneous tooth decay, no unkempt beard. It took a bit of patience, but Phil helped to remind me that in light of eternity, in light of God's grace to us, a silly thing like a lost tooth is really no matter at all.
He also made me show him, which I only barely promised to do - and only on the stipulation that he wouldn't laugh at me. This was inevitably lost in the fact that we were both already cracking up a bit. And so with a lighter heart, I left my crown on top of my dresser (because Phil told me that if I swallowed it in the middle of the night, I was on my own for the retrieval process), and settled in to sleep.
I must admit that I still went to bed a little anxious and managed to drum up a variety of nightmares about losing all my other teeth, my crown disintegrating in my hands, and other atrocities, but this morning, Phil's kind words and annoying-but-I-secretly-love-it sense of humor helped me get my head in the right place again. We even managed to have a serious conversation about whether or not we would allow our kids to get their ears pierced. Until, that is, he got to laughing about my new-found toothless lisp.
Nevertheless, I got myself to the dentist right when they opened, and they were able to put the tooth back with temporary cement. I made an appointment to have it permanently fixed in a couple of weeks and was on my merry way. No biting into apples for the time being, but at least I could leave my hook-hand behind and go back to talking like normal ol' me.
ARrrrrrRRRRrrrr!