Writing a column can be joyous! Writing a column can be
painful!
Writing a column can be joyous! Writing a column can be painful! The great joy is that I get to write this column every week. The great pain is I still get to write it after a trip to my dentist’s office.
After living with my lone wisdom tooth for 52 years, I finally had to say good bye-it was time to have it pulled, giving up any chance for wisdom I had dare hoped for.
Instead, I found myself sitting in that chair, the dreaded chair of torture (mostly in my own head) and having to calm myself because the sight of dental apparatus is foreboding by appearance.
I’m having a hard time being witty; it just ain’t happening. Pulling words and ideas out of my head has become as painful as pulling the tooth out of my mouth.
If it isn’t bad enough trying to talk with a swollen mouth, I caught a cold from hell that I cannot seem to shake. The combined crunch of election deadlines and regular deadlines left no room for a personal life, except for the therapy session obtained while writing this column.
And you know what? There never is a good time to have a tooth extracted. The anxiety of having someone yank out a well-rooted tooth is not a welcome image. As I tried to write this column, all I could think of was the pain of the wisdom tooth, which is still tucked under my pillow along with a Kleenex tissue.
Over the last month we’ve had a lot of commotion at our home. Cousin Nene is still recuperating with us and makes the least amount of noise except at 2 o’clock in the morning. “Did you hear that truck?” she hollers while in a dead sleep.
We still have that skunk situation and other states of family affairs to deal with that feel more like a bad tooth in need of extraction. But between work, being the mother of a bride-to-be who lives 2,000 miles away and preparing Linda’s Last Chance Ranch for winter rain, who had time to remember the dental appointment? If it wasn’t for the courtesy call from the dental office I would have easily let it slip by.
Of course, family members living out of state are often removed from what our immediate daily life is like, but as usual they expect my undivided attention because they assume I have no life, least of all a dental appointment.
“No, your mom can’t talk right now. We’re trying to get her to eat so she can take some drugs and go lay down,” said Nene to my daughter-the-bride-to be, who replied, “She doesn’t have to talk. All she has to do is listen.” Believe me I wouldn’t have heard a word.
This miserable influenza has kicked my butt for two weeks. I can’t remember when I’ve ever been so ill. I have avoided the telephone because it hurts to talk. My kids have accused me of blowing them off – better than listening to me wheezing and gagging between words.
“Gee, mom,” says the youngest. “Maybe you should go back to bed.”
All I could muster was the hope that the conversation would end so I could drop my head onto the pillow. Besides, I’m still waiting for the Tooth Fairy to cash me in.
Who was that man in pink tights wearing my Marilyn Monroe wig? That was no man, that was my first husband in drag. And I thought he was just the Tooth Fairy. No, Linda, it was an influenza dream.
