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...and they lived happily ever after. Smith & Lady: poets, artists, photographers & adventurers.
Our relationship was forged to the soundtrack of Yoko Ono's magic,
frenetic, love-laden song, "Walking On Thin Ice." ( play song )
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Archive for the ‘Healthcare’ Category
Tuesday, February 19th, 2013
Magic mouth – foto Smith
My sister emailed asking if I were alright . . . she was worried because I hadn’t blogged for four days. Guess that says something about how wordy I’ve become.
We’ve posted almost a blog a day since June 25, 2006, which means except for our first ten months, Lady’s and my life is online with almost daily reminders of where we were and what we were doing — 2,846 blogs with more than 7,000 fotos from 10 countries on three continents posted in the past 2,431 days (of course for the first two and a half years Lady and I were both blogging daily).
If the cops were to pick me up and ask what I was doing 5 years ago, I could read the blog and tell them.
This is kind of funny because when Lady started blogging in June 2006 I asked her why she would want to do such a thing; then took a taste myself and got hooked.
I’ve been quiet lately because my last eight upper teeth being pulled and a thick chunk of plastic teeth slapped into my mouth a week ago has consumed my thoughts. Tried an open mic last Friday as a poetry reading test and found I whistle my esses and slur certain thickened sounds whenever my tongue slides against the plastic teeth.
An online article says it takes a week to acclimate to false teeth for every ten years of age, which leaves me with six more weeks suffering before I get used to it. Funny how no one tells you these things before the procedure. I have to sing my lyrics for the first time in public a month from now and wonder how it will go.
Oh well, suffer now for a better tomorrow, in my continuing process of trying to rise to meet the horizon
Take care of your teeth folk; you don’t want to be where my mouth is, which seems to be one of the lower levels of purgatory.
Need some diversions – foto Smith
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Thursday, February 14th, 2013
Transparent skull in dental office – foto Smith
Can’t blame them, they were only fighting for their existence, but two of my eight teeth pulled yesterday did not want to go.
In fact reality conspired against me making it to the dental chair in the first place, even though we left early.
The dental school parking lot was full, as was my first special-knowledge free-parking side street.
The second hidden free-parking back street had an open *trick* parking space which tried to eat us . . . it was an open ice sheet with holes, and as I tried to pull in, the front tire got stuck in an ice-hole pocket while the rear tires were trapped by an ice-lip — the car rear sticking out in traffic. Couldn’t push due to the ice sheet.
I got a chunk of concrete and was smashing the fore and aft ice-sheets to create rocking room when an electrical lineman walked up with blue salt pellets and sprinkled them under the tires (there always seems to be a helpful angel stranger who comes along unbidden when we’re in a serious bind) . . . and between the salt and ice-smashing, it worked.
Headed for the main pay lot because we were running out of time, only to find the parking lot literally gone, turned into a construction lot. Eventually found a high rise lot where I almost backed into another car that snuck up behind me.
After plopping down $550 to pull eight teeth (probably half the normal price due to dental school status), my last two teeth put up a serious fight. Don’t believe one is supposed to hear that much cracking and breaking teeth bone inside one’s head.
Now I have a gigantic chunk of plastic in my mouth masquerading as teeth but basically acting as a gag-reflex initiator . . . as I talk, certain tongue-roof–mouth dances make me feel like vomiting. Fortunately I know I’ll acclimate to this because the body/mind can get used to almost anything (look at the Bush/Cheney years) . . . thank goodness we have no poetry or book readings because I’m going to have to relearn how to talk, and eat, and swallow.
All in all not something I recommend to others . . . what I do enthusiastically shout out though is TAKE CARE OF YOUR TEETH WHEN YOU’RE YOUNG cuz you don’t want to be me right now. I’m in one of those situations where I don’t want to be yet have no choice but to endure.
My mother-in-law, who is four years younger than I, commented that I’m finally toothless . . . reminded her I’m keeping eight bottom teeth, plus I can always gum evil-doers into submission if I must.
Skull in dentist office – foto Smith
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Wednesday, February 13th, 2013
Pulled this one myself last year – fotos Smith
Since dental students are pulling my last eight upper teeth today, I scanned 50 years of my poetry for tooth references and found eleven, mostly negative, all from the past 8 years . . . the worse my teeth got, the more they crept into my words.
I’m rolling seven dice like dead man’s teeth / and counting all the dots
Teeth are falling out / My muscle body broken / But I am wiser
They lie through their teeth / They crush what is good
what we cannot with grasping / or rending with our teeth
No wailing / No gnashing of teeth / When I go
teeth in nasty places
be made to muse till long in tooth
Oh yes / It’s all tits and toothpaste / A test tease totality / In textbook time
This crown broke off at the gum line last year – foto Smith
Posted in health, Healthcare, Photography, Poetry | 1 Comment »
Monday, February 11th, 2013
Smith is getting his eight remaining upper teeth pulled Wednesday, the day before Valentine’s Day. I’m glad that he’s getting this done because it’s been so hard for him to chew properly. When he gets used to the dentures, this will be easier.
I asked how it is he got such tooth problems:
“Number one,” he said, “I have small teeth. Number two, we were poor. Couldn’t afford much dental work unless we had to. Number three, from ’53 to ’60, I was raised on a farm with well water. So I didn’t get the benefit of the fluoride the government started putting in the water ’bout then. Number four, when I went into the Navy, they pulled some bad teeth and said they’d replace them. They lied. Number five: when I finally had some money and started going to dentists, I got stuck with some really bad ones. One dentist even took my straight bottom teeth and made them crooked with a retainer. Number six: since I was a contractor, there were times when I didn’t have any work, yet I had to get teeth fixed. So instead of getting crowns I couldn’t afford, teeth were pulled that shouldn’t have been. Finally, I just had bad luck with teeth. My karma; seems to be.”
“How do you feel about Wednesday?”
“Oh, I think getting false upper teeth is a setback to me. It’s a line I didn’t want to cross. But I’m not worried about it. They’ll pull them, they’ll give me pain pills. The only thing I’m worried about is the temporary upper denture that won’t fit well, won’t feel good, and I have a very high gag reflex. So… it’s not going to be fun.”
I’d not really given much thought to dentures prior to hooking up with Smith. My first memory of them was Grandpa Ireland popping the teeth out at us to freak us out. Grandpa ate anything. He ate salad, he could tear at steak, he could eat corn-on-the-cob. He had dentures most of his life due to having had some kind of illness in his teens.
“I’m not worried about eating,” Smith said. “It’s just a line I didn’t want to cross, losing my teeth.”
As a forty-year-old, witnessing Smith’s tooth problems helps keep me in line brushing my teeth and seeing the dentist regularly for cleanings. Being so much younger than my partner has had some costs but has also helped me to prepare better for the future. I’m starting an IRA, I’m taking care of my teeth, I’m really working on my diet and exercise with my comfort in the long term future in mind.
The downside of being with someone who is so much older is that there is a lot of worry over my partner’s health and sadness over the thought of losing him before I die. And the mysticism of older people is pretty much gone… my parents don’t seem much like parents to me anymore in terms of authority–now they are more like peers.
~ Lady
Posted in Being, Conversations, couples, Family, health, Healthcare, Lady, ladymemoir, Letters to the Universe, life, Relationships, smith & Lady, Smith biography | No Comments »
Thursday, August 2nd, 2012
A pretty picture to prime pretty thoughts;
a rose from my Granny-in-law’s funeral yesterday
Hmmmm . . . bad day at black rock, or Zen lesson in acceptance?
Got so stressed this morning my throat tightened and the watermelon I was eating got stuck in my esophagus and I didn’t realize it and swallowed a couple more bites which got stuck on top of the stuck so it was off to the sink to toss many pre-chewed chunks of mashed red pulp. (Looks and sounds much worse than it is — but I’m a writer and drama’s my beat, although I fare better at humor.)
I was tense before I was tense due to the surprising intensity of Granny’s funeral/funeral lunch/memorial service yesterday with its emotions and hordes of people, but was extra tense today because I was to have nine teeth extracted at Case Dental School. They were to pull my remaining eight upper teeth and a lower wisdom tooth, then my South Korean dental student would slap in a temporary upper denture plate and in six months when the swelling’s down and bone loss finalized replace it with a real denture.
Only there was no temporary plate. And there was no student dentist. They called around to see if he had the denture and found he was in Korea, hopefully on vacation.
They offered to pull my teeth anyway and then next week when the student theoretically returns they’d slap the temporary in; but the thought of walking around for a week or two with no upper teeth which means a lot less food didn’t exactly appeal.
I don’t even know my student’s coming back. I was told there was a different student’s name on my next appointment.
More important, the initial purpose of the temporary plate is to control and shape the swelling as it heals.
But as always there’s a silver lining. At least I’m not sitting here in pain right now wondering if the swelling will be down enough in four weeks for my quarterly poetry hosting gig.
It’s heck being poor . . . your body pays more along the way.
Charity
We don’t have much
Not enough for mouth to month
But wife gives of what we have
To others with less
The poor are more gracious than the rich
Who give bigger
From their greater
Yet matter less
There’s pain in giving
There’s pain in not giving
She’s priming the pump
Betting on living
— Smith, 2011
Another rose from Granny’s funeral
on top of Granny’s shawl
Posted in health, Healthcare, Photography, Poetry | No Comments »
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