I went to the dentist last week. Nothing major, but major enough to have both top and bottom gums frozen with half a dozen injections and then twenty minutes of deep, deep, cleaning.
Walking to the dentist, all fresh breeze, scudding clouds, bursts of sunshine, and the ever present threat of rain, reminded me of my long walks to school as boy and teenager. It was that sort of day, one of those past days so full of potential, odd really as I was only going to the dentist, but at the same time I there was a strangeness to the walk, and I hadn’t even had the drugs yet. I could see an early autumn on the way –chestnuts forming, conkers already brown inside the spiky green, some leaves beginning to attract their autumn hue – must be the hot weather
Walking back from the dentist was even stranger. I needed more injections than expected and I was floating. The world had a rosy glow, colours were even more vivid, everything had a slightly slanted perspective and I seemed to float a little above the pavement. Amazing.
I get the second half of the treatment next week, can’t wait.
I got the same feeling from some painkillers I got from an American on holiday last year. My back went and I was in real pain. I went to see the doctor, but he could not give me any pain killers as they are illegal in the Maldives. An American woman who I'd been talking to outside the surgery could not believe it. She gave me 3 of her special tablets. I spent the next few days just staring at trees, the sea, sand anything really. I just smiled, and smiled. It was brilliant.
ReplyDeleteSad how few children get to walk to school these days. I used to pick flowers for my mum on the way home - now of course I realise it was wrong to lean over fences and pluck flowers from people's borders.
ReplyDeleteYes Glynne - sometimes the drugs DO work
ReplyDeleteI heard a story recently about a woman who let her seven year old boy ride his bike to school (on the pavement, not road).
ReplyDeleteIt sparked a huge debate on Radio 2 about whether this was reckless / dangerous / irresponsible or not.
When I was six I walked my four year old sister to school. It was about two miles, crossing three roads (two without a lolly-pop lady), passing through Gas Alley (where the vampires lived) and we did this four times a day.
I don't know what to comment in terms of our society but it seems that at some point we have lost our perspective when it comes to risk. Risk is necessary if we are to move forward.
I hate the dentist, Do you remember the mobile dentist caravan that use to come to the John Hampden when we were kids? That dentist drilled and filled without the use of anaesthetic, it was a nightmare.
ReplyDeleteI do think there is too much helicoptor parenting - heard of an 18 yr old who hadn't been on a bus before, imagine going off to college without ever having been on a bus on your own.
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