One Fairy I Can Do Without

It's been almost two weeks since my visit to the dentist. More than enough time for x-rays to have come back and been examined. Since I've heard nothing about abscesses, root canals or other dental doom, I'm going to settle into the conclusion with which I, provisionally, left the office.

I'm still 100% cavity-free.

Which basically means that, taken individually, each of my teeth is in great shape. My bite's still off, and the crooked teeth seem to move further into overlap each year, but, damn, the enamel is strong.

I have to attribute this, at least in part, to intense fluoridation as a child. Springfield probably had fluoridated water to begin with when I was a kid. But that was also probably insignificant next to the direct insertion of fluoride into my daily diet. As I recall, my pediatrician had my mom putting fluoride drops into pretty much everything I drank at home. Whatever else it it may done, it seems to have had the desired effect on my teeth.

I certainly can't credit genetics with any of my dental characteristics other than crooked and compacted teeth; my dad was wearing partial plate dentures before I was born, my mom had a mouth full of fillings and her mother had hardly any of her own teeth. My screwed-up bite? Genetic. My strong teeth? Not so much.

It's also worth noting that I rebelled against traditional tooth behavior as a young child. Whenever one of my baby teeth started to get ready to go, the loose tooth would drive me nuts. I'd worry it with my tongue, sometimes get a finger in there and wiggle it. A number of times I ended up just yanking the thing out myself. Not painful, really, but usually rather bloody, enough to get adults upset.

And I tended to hold onto the teeth themselves. Perhaps fearing that the fetishistic fairy could not be trusted, and loath to risk such powerfully personal voodoo doll ingredient falling into the wrong hands, I kept the things. I still have some of them, but I'm not telling where.