CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
This week I'll ask you a question,and I hope my inmail box will get crammed with your answers.
Come on, relax, it's neither a spoof question nor a tricky one ! Yet, it is far from being innocent...
Once I have read your answers, either I'll get relieved to find out " I am not the only one who...", or I'll feel ashamed to be so cowardly.
So, here is my question :
What is the scariest and most dreadful place you have ever been to ?
I already guess some of you will answer " the catacombs, the sewers or the scenic railway ", whereas the most adventurous backpackers will mention bone-chilling destinations in the world.
Anyway, in the meantime let me cherish the hope that some of you will strengthen and share my belief that the most frightful place to visit is undoubtedly .... a dental surgery !
Come on, don't laugh at me ! I'm not wimpy, but when it comes to making an appointment at the dentist, I get in a tizzy.
Just thinking about it makes my heart drop to the pit of my stomach !
Even though my dentist is awesome (I've known some quacks), and does his best to ease my anxiety, stepping into his surgery is just like being dragged to a scaffold to be hanged. I'm not kidding !!
I've already thought of asking him for laughing gas or full sedation, but up to now I have strived to put up a good show ! ( hum, more or less..).
Yet, as soon as the high-pitched sound of the drill goes off, I get shivers all along my spine. I turn into a bundle of nerves and I cling to the arms of the dental chair so tight that there must be my handprints on them
(not so flattering and glamorous as on Hollywood Boulevard, unfortunately !).
So, last week when I woke up in the middle of the night with a nagging toothache, I immediately knew the time had come to call my
" executioner".
While dialling his number, I secretly hoped the line would go dead, he would be off duty, or too busy to squeeze me in. Lost illusions !!
The secretary gave me an appointment for the very day !
I checked my calendar ( you remember the funny one I told you about in chapter " Party Time"): it was Tooth Fairy day !
What a coincidence !!
All the more striking as when the dentist x-rayed my gum, he found out a tiny chip of baby tooth abandonned there to its fate ages ago by a
so-called professional ..
Before I got a chance to decline the treatment and say I would not open my mouth without a lawyer in the room, the dentist had numbed my jaw and pulled out the minute pain trigger.
Phew !! I rinsed my mouth, wiped my clammy hands, and to act as if nothing had happened, I asked jokingly :
" Today is Tooth Fairy Day. Do you think if I put the little piece of my baby tooth under my pillow, I'll get a present tomorrow ? ".
My dentist is reserved, but quick on the draw, and he answered mischievously :
" Just in case the tooth fairy should be too busy to come round your place, let me give you a present in advance : an autograph from the kindest dentist in the region ! Look ! Just at the bottom of my bill ! ".
Jeez !! At that moment, a definition of the word 'dentist' I had read on the web flashed through my mind :
" A dentist is a prestidigitator who, putting metal in your mouth, pulls coins out of your pocket ".
Now you know busy bees can be yellow bellies, so, when you answer my question about the scariest place you have been to, don't feel ahamed, let yourself go !!
Today a clue about the title because the pun can't be translated into French :
to have some teeth : avoir du mordant (fig)
