Dentist

I went to the dentist today.

I always like going to the dentist.

I woke up at 7:30 at my brother's apartment in Provo and was disappointed to discover that although it was easy to steal shower sauce and a towel from unsuspecting room mates, it was not so easy to come across some kind of edible breakfast substance. Evidently, this apartment housed a chronic breakfast cereal. All privately-purchased breakfast cereals were forced to go into hiding. After the visit to the dentist, my brother took me to his closet where he offered me three sorts of cereal (including the new Raisin Bran Crunch, which reminds me of the illegitimate offspring of a fling between Raisin Bran and Corn Flakes at a Western Family reunion).

However, at 7:45, I couldn't find any breakfast, so I stuffed a couple of wheat thins into my mouth and took off on my brother's bike for Dr. Vogel's.

I arrived at the office, and asked to brush my teeth. Conveniently, they had a little bathroom where I could perform an oral 'cram' for the impending examination.

"Kendell, we appreciate your business, and we hope that we can be there when you need us, fulfilling all of your dental needs."

The pre-examination interview began with a heartfelt commitment.

Then the dentist turned to smalltalk and proudly exclaimed, "My name is German" when he found that I was just in Germany.

I read on his white coat, "Dr. Rodgers?"

Bashfully, he called his assistant to get him his real coat. I guess he had put the coat of the other dentist on. At this point, our relationship of trust began to waver. And I began referring to myself by my real name, "Axel."

When prompted to elaborate on my dental history, I explained that I had always had pretty good teeth. I had probably two cavities filled before my mission, then came back without cavities. However, ever since the financial crisis, I have been having a lot of cavities.

I let him draw his own conclusions about my dental health status.

He then informed me that three things play a role in good dental health.

"The first one is proper dental hygiene, which involves brushing and flossing your teeth, and stuff like that. The second is diet. Well, actually, maybe these aren't ordered in order of importance."

"Really?"

"Yeah. A lot of cavities are caused by our diet, specifically Western foods. Did you know that in Ethiopia, they don't have any cavities at all because they eat a different diet than we do? They may have gum disease, but no cavities."

"Or they have no cavities because they don't eat at all."

I talked with my brother when I got home, and we decided it could also be caused by a relatively stable, crisis-free economy which is in a perpetual state of poverty. Well, actually, Wikipedia reports that Ethiopia has one of the fastest growing world economies. Just wait till they have an economic crisis, and then you'll see a huge jump in cavities.

After Dr. Vogel tried to pull the wool over my eyes by concealing his identity and wearing the wrong name on his coat, I didn't believe his Ethiopia story. I just ran a google search, and came up with several studies on the Ethiopian dental status. This one reports that several regions have naturally-occurring high-fluoride water (12 ppm in Wonji.. in 1994, 1 ppm was recommended as an absolute maximum for water fluoridation) and in areas like Wonji, all 13-14-year-old children have dental fluorosis. Which is bad. Incidentally, the soccer team in Wonji is called the "Wonji Sugar". This report found that of the sample, 51% of the subjects had decayed teeth. That's a lot.

So, no, Dr. Vogel, people in Ethiopia have cavities too. So it won't help if Mom makes us wat atop injera every night.

Dr. Vogel didn't mention what the third unordered important part of good dental hygiene was. I suspected that it had something to do with trusting your dentist even in times of financial crises.

I mentioned to Dr. Vogel that even though I flossed every day, the hygienist always succeeds in making me bleed when she pokes my gums. I asked him if he could tell me if I was doing something wrong. He told me that my hygienist would help me. I was led to the dental hygienist's room. Before pulling aside the black curtain that covered the entrance, Dr. Vogel called out to the hygienist, and I heard a thump as if someone had been hanging on the ceiling and had jumped to the floor. The curtain was drawn back revealing a dark room and a rather pasty-looking dental hygienist who seemed to look hungrily at my gums, licking her lips then quickly withdrawing her tongue back into her mouth, between two rather alarmingly long canines.

The dentist pushed me into the room, then shuffled off.

I was brought to the chair, which was already declined and seemed to be fastened to the top of what appeared to be an alter of sorts.

I broke the silence, explaining that my gums never bled at home, and that maybe she could give me some advice on how to floss better. At the mention of blood, the hygienist's eyes seemed to dance a little.

She informed me that she would rather perform a "gum examination" first, and asked me if I had had one before.

"Is that where you poke my gums with a sharp object and then tell me that I need to floss more?"

"Yeah, it sounds like you have had one before."

"Yes. Could you help me with my flossing?"

"No, let me poke you first.. I mean let me perform the examination, then I will help you with your flossing." (She actually really did say that.)

I lost about three quarts of blood during the gum examination, which the hygienist carefully sucked off "for later."

In the end, it turned out that it isn't a flossing issue at all. It was a vampire issue. Actually, they informed me that I was a "mouth breather" and that causes gum disease. When I called the hygienist a "blood sucker" she grew livid and said I could go home.

But I didn't have any cavities. That was good.

Perhaps it has to do with the fact that we are pulling out of the financial crisis.