Slices of my daily life

There I was sitting in ‘The Chair’ with a plastic thingy in my mouth to keep it open while my dentist used frightening and noisy drilling and scraping machines to repair the damage caused to my teeth due to my phobia of visiting dentists. As usual, there was music playing in the background. When the first song ended and second one began, intently staring into a cavity, he asked me, “So, tell me, who is this singer ?” !!!!! My dentist’s a funny chap.

Other dentists say the usual ‘This won’t hurt at all’ or ‘I’m almost finished’. Although you know that it’s absolutely not true, you let yourself be fooled a little into believing it because hope keeps you going. But not so with my dentist. He believes in telling it like it is. ‘Brace yourself, this will hurt.’, ‘You have to bear with it because it will take another half an hour to finish.’, etc. are sentences he routinely says nonchalantly.  Once, just as I was sitting down in ‘The Chair’, he even said, ‘Make yourself comfortable because once I start the work I’ll only stop after it’s done and that will take around an hour.’ ! Err… ‘Make yourself comfortable…’ ??? In ‘The Chair’ ???!!!! My dentist’s a funny chap.

I have recently begun dental treatment after I could no longer ‘stoically’ bear with the pain. As expected, there’s a lot of work to be done. My regular (?) dentist is our good acquaintance from theatre. He is a dentist and loves to act as well. He seriously makes time for his hobby. We have known each other for long. There is a comfortable rapport. Plus he is a good dentist too :) That’s how he became TH’s and my regular dentist. As you go in, first he’ll have a long chat with you in the consulting room about a variety of topics, none of which are even remotely connected to teeth. Then he’ll have you sit on ‘The Chair’ and examine your teeth. Then he’ll take you back to the consulting room and draw elaborate diagrams and explain in great detail what is wrong with your teeth (without once telling you how it is all your fault !) and how he is going to treat it and how your teeth will be once he is done. Then he’ll ask you your favourite type of music. Then back you go to ‘The Cha...