it's a hard knock life

I almost drowned at the dentist on Saturday. I’ve never had a fear of the dentist. Well, other than the time he wanted to pull my tooth when I was little and I refused to open my mouth. I take good care of my teeth so a visit to the dentist is a fairly simple procedure. Well, this weekend it was anything but simple.

Saturday morning I braved the weather and drove through the ice and snow to get to my 6-month check up/cleaning. The dental hygienist that’s usually there was on vacation so I had a new girl working on me. She was odd. I could tell that she was new at her job and very nervous. I tried to put her at ease by making small talk with her. Well, this spurred her on to talk non-stop during the appointment. Have you ever been sitting in the dentists chair with tools in your mouth and the person working on you asks you questions that require more than a yes or no answer? This is what happened to me. I was in the chair with the water sprayer, spit sucker and the thingy with the mirror and the light in my mouth and she began to ask me where I work and what I do for a living. How do you talk at this point and say “accounting” without either gagging or drooling? Apparently she understood what I said because it made her very excited. You see, her husband is an accounting major in college and is looking for an internship. She would love for him to get a job at my company. All the while she was talking she had the tools in my mouth. The problem was that the spit sucker was turned off but the water sprayer was not. My mouth was filling up with water. I didn’t know what to do. Should I start gargling so she realizes that it’s time to turn the water sprayer off? I seriously considered that. But then something happened and she pushed one of the tools farther into my mouth. I started choking on the tool and the water. I was going to drown in the dentists’ chair. She finally stopped talking long enough to realize what was going on. I grabbed the spit sucker from her and turned it on. Needless to say, she let me be in charge of the spit sucker for the rest of the appointment. The only other thing I could have used while there was a towel. When she started polishing my teeth with that green fluoride stuff it splattered all over my face.

I was almost giddy with excitement when she was finally finished and it was time for the actual dentist to come in. I don’t have to go back for six more months now. Hopefully she’ll be more experienced by then. Or even better…my old dental hygienist won’t be on vacation.