The Dentist's Drill

I went for my annual dental check-up a couple of months back and was told that my teeth are aging right along with the rest of me. An old bridge was due to collapse, so that became a pricey priority, with $3500 due at the time service was provided. Now, after 4 weeks of various appointments, it's a nice-looking bridge and fits really well, but I had intended to us my annual dispersement from my retirement fund to replace the flooring in my master bedroom, not for a dental device.

Along with the new bridge came extreme sensitivity to both heat and cold, sensitivity to the point of screaming in pain when I took a big gulp of my favorite hot chai tea latte. A trip back into the dental chair determined that I could have a root problem flaring up, so we put some magical medicine on the teeth and gave it a week. It got worse; much worse. I went back again and we tried the magical medicine again, but it didn't work any better than it had the first go-round, so I stopped by the office Monday and waved the white flag of surrender to whatever it would take to make the pain go away.

What it took was a root canal, $900 due at the time of service. Of course. If you're doing Liza Logic, we're now up to spending $4400 on fixing aging teeth, rather than in running amok and having a great time somewhere doing something outrageous. Or replacing the bedroom carpeting with something the dog has not peed on. Yet.

As I sat in the chair today, I thought how much different my teaching experience would have been if I earned $900 an hour and had a full-time assistant right there, doing all the "grunt" work while I was merely the highly paid professional teaching star of the show.

The good news is, at the end of the hour, I was finished and yes, it looks really great; however, the test was hot chai tea latte -- which, I'm happy to say -- went into the mouth, swirled around, and was swallowed with absolutely no pain whatsoever. So, I guess in some ways it is worth whatever it cost to get rid of the pain and have one whole side of my mouth updated with new porcelain fillings. Right? I mean, who needs to go on another cruise? or go visit her children over the holidays? or buy holiday gifts for that matter? And, I still have another 24 or so teeth that probably will require advanced dental care in my future.

Ah, the joys of living longer and having all this discretionary income at my disposal.