By Bob Stevens, The Muddled Male
I
think that I am going to live forever. You
are probably thinking that is impossible, and I would have agreed with you a
month ago, but now I am beginning to believe that I may never expire. And it is my dentist’s fault, as I am certain
you will agree once you read my explanation.
Remember that the last time you read
this column I mentioned that I had been to our dentist to see about fixing a
painful tooth. The problem was easily corrected
by a simple extraction, leaving Ann, my wife, disappointed because the
extraction took less than a minute and caused me no pain. Before proceeding with the extraction my
dentist, who is very professional and explains things carefully prior to any
procedure, sat with me to discuss the advantages and/or disadvantages of doing a
root canal followed by the purchase of an expensive crown, or grabbing the
offending tooth with a pair of pliers he keeps around the office and just jerk
it out. As I was pondering the options I
happened to mention that I was turning eighty soon and didn’t want to spend a
lot of money on something that would last longer than I would. In an attempt to reassure me my dentist responded,
“Oh you will still be around for a long
time. In fact, after you reach one
hundred I will begin doing your dental work for nothing.”
Well
I laughed because I suspected he was joking, but Ann took him to be serious and
immediately began planning a change in my eating and exercise habits to make
certain that I would last long enough for her to collect on what she considered
to be a generous offer from our trusted dentist. Ann, you see, is very frugal. If you searched our house you would find the
storage area under our stairs filled with various sizes and shapes of empty
cardboard boxes, and our three-car garage filled with similar boxes but larger
in size. All of that because she saves
every box in case, according to Ann, “We happen
to need a box to hold something we want to ship or store.” I used to argue but got caught too many times stealing
a box from her collection because it was just the right size and shape to hold
something I needed to hold, and I didn’t want to drive to Logan just to buy an
empty box.
And
she hates to throw away something of substance because, as she keeps telling me,
“You never know when we might need just that
particular item.” Take today, for
example, when she found a bottle of medicine purchased in 1994 which was for
her mother who lived with us on and off through her declining years until she
died in 1995. I’m not certain how the
bottle ended up still sitting in our medicine cabinet since we had packed up
and moved three times since 1995, but there it was, and she was struggling with
the possibility that I might encourage her to throw it out. I shouldn’t complain, however, since her
hesitancy to chuck things out just because they are old and of no value
probably saved my marriage several times over the past sixty years.
So
if you see a little old couple pull into Walmart to buy a few groceries and
park at the far end of the lot where the wife forces the gray haired old man to
shuffle a half mile to the store entrance as a way of getting him to exercise,
that might be us. And if you see the
wife grab the little old man by the ear as a way of pulling him past the
M&M Peanuts and over to the broccoli, that will definitely be us. I may
not be able to walk when I am one hundred, but since I will be getting free
dental care I should be able to chew.
That assumes, of course, that during the next twenty years our dentist
doesn’t earn enough replacing my crowns to retire and move to a private island
somewhere in the South Pacific where he surfs but no longer works. Although for the life of me I can’t believe
he would move to the South Pacific and leave an office full of gorgeous
assistants.
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