"Unless You Bite Your Fork"

Back in NYC, I had this fantastic, if not bizarre, dentist. She had crazy curly hair, a bit of a lisp, and a thick Eastern European accent. Like many dentists, she was always trying to get me to do expensive procedures on my teeth, which I often brushed off since even with the 80-20% insurance pay, I still couldn't afford most of them. At first I was turned off by her, finding her too pushy, but I grew to really like her in the end.

Since I only just got braces at 19 years old, I'm pretty fond of and grateful for my smile. Pre-19 was not a pretty sight. But unfortunately, my teeth are made of butter. I have fillings in nearly every single one, and every time I go to the dentist, SOMETHING is wrong. Not to mention they've never been all that white, even when I was a child. "Some people just have naturally yellow teeth," dentists have told me. Wonderful. This means that most of the whitening stuff out there doesn't do shit, since I'm not REMOVING any wine/coffee/cigarette stains. That's just their lovely natural hue.

So, back in NYC, after fixing one of my front teeth AGAIN (did you know you can get a filling BETWEEN your teeth?!?!), she suggested getting porcelain veneers, which were thousands per tooth. Yeah, right. Finally, with a bit of old-world haggling going back and forth, we compromised. I would get crowns done on my four front teeth, and would pay just $75 per tooth, no matter what she really charged, or really, no matter what she was charging the insurance company. In addition, they would be a bit of a lighter color as well, though not Britney Spears-white. It wasn't supposed to actually clash with the rest of my teeth, but brighten them somewhat. I agreed to do this over a period of time, and ended up totally happy with the result. She even kind of reshaped my two front teeth, which were rather worn down. She gave me those Jessica Simpson bunny teeth, though not that exaggerated, which are apparently a dentist's trick to make you look younger.

Gazing at them in her hand mirror, I asked, "How long will these last for?" Expecting some "Ten or twenty years" answer, I almost fell out of the dental chair when she said, "Oh, assuming you take good care of them, about 2-4 years. That is, if you don't bite your fork or anything." Thinking about paying for and going through all this again in just a couple years was a bit scary, since I knew I wouldn't be in NYC forever, and who knew when I'd have ANY kind of dental insurance again (I haven't since then).

Though I am not, in fact, a fork-biter, I have been conscientious about my teeth since then, and have had the occasional vision of just ONE of these things falling off, revealing the less attractive real tooth behind, like the mask falling off the Phantom of the Opera. It's been a few years now, and I've been hoping to get as much wear out of these choppers as possible.

Well, time is ticking away, or maybe it's time for me to fit back in, in Missouri, the place where I didn't originally fit in for "having all" my teeth. It all started yesterday when I went to hang up a pair of Beau's slacks. I have this weird habit where I usually stick the top of the plastic hanger in my mouth while with my two hands, I button up the first couple buttons on a shirt. I know, hygienic. Well, this time it was a metal hanger, and a heavy one that holds multiple pairs of slacks. I put it in my mouth, using my two hands to put the pants on the hanger, and then took it out of my mouth and hung it up. As I was removing it, I felt a slight grit in my mouth. I spit some in my hand and looked at it. Disgusted that there may have been some dirt on the hanger, I rubbed it off and went on with my cleaning.

Hours later, I was sitting in my car in the Safeway parking lot, talking to my mother on the phone. At one point, I drew down the mirror on the visor, checking out my face (oh my GOD I need to pluck my massive eyebrows!) and smiled at my reflection, absentmindedly checking my teeth.

Wait a minute.

There, right on my front tooth, was a chip. A ragged, sharp, chip. If I wasn't talking to my mother, I probably would have cried. The irony? JUST the other day, Beau and I were talking about our lack of health coverage, and I said, "You know, I'd almost rather break a leg or get some awful illness than have a dental issue. You can get reasonable health care sometimes, but FORGET finding affordable dental care!" And I'm sure my chipped front tooth is considered cosmetic anyway. Great! How the hell do I get this fixed?

I thought of all the chipped, missing, and snarly teeth I'd seen in Smalltown, Missouri.

Oh god, now I'm a hick!