Mid-day, sitting in Dental Surgeon Mason Lee's chair, everything happening quickly yet slowly, sufficient topical medications, music therapy (the first three sections of The Bible -- The Creation; Quartet for the Beginning of Time: Adam & Eve & Cain & Abel; Noah's Flood [Noah! Noah!] -- with which the good doctor finds favor), and the stricken lower back left ivory is liberated with a sensation no more than would be expected pre a visit from the Tooth Fairy. Of course, there is no faithful replacement in waiting, and the thoughts of mortality are palpable.
All
on
an
unexpected
day
that
begins
not
without
foreboding --
the arrangement to see friend-and-Dr. Melissa Rinck has been scheduled, after all, not without reason, earlier this week.
But the scenic drive down I-80,
across
route
37
through
Sonoma
and
Marin,
and
southward
on
101
is
insufficient to deal with the shock of the discovery -- from last diagnosed healthy to now "dead": what a word, what a world...
The seredipity of the highly-recommended extraction office, with immediate appointment availability, at the opposite end of this difficult-to-get-one's bearings symmetrical (but old modernist-aesthetically-pleasing) structure, must certainly be acknowledged, yet still all smacks of unreality.
Rising to the occasion, however, general aenesthesia is avoided, present company is deemed a fine patient
(true miracle that... one supposes that the genial jokes marginally masked the sheer terror), and the rest of the day's agenda is scrupulously maintained
(after a stop for
medication -- where one's compromiseed responses smack of the Wizard-of-Oz Tin Man's "Oil can!"),
with both doctor's approval,
first
to
the
21st-Century Music post-box for a distinct, yet-mercifully-not-totally-unexpected, financial windfall ('tis the season of renewals, after all), then errands about town,
a revisit to the Surgeon General Dentissimo for further advice re the possibly faint-inducing potential crimson tide (whose only defense seems to be the Becketian Endgameian "Old stancher! (Pause.) You... remain.").
There's even energy and time for tune-up
(autowise, of course, since the physicality seems beyond further help, at least today) towards Novato Toyota.
Head over to Chevy's for the interval
(had joked eaflier that Mexican food was probably out of the question, and response had been to the effect that there are no particular dietary restrictions, other than to avoid small crunchy food + cigarettes and straws -- have always suspected the latter as a carcinogen...), for simply tortilla soup (soak until uncrispy) and water,
taking the chips and salsa to go for a later, more healthy date (i.e., Harriet?).
A
slow
procession
homeward,
not
unexpected
from
both
health
(at least the car was given a semi-clean bill!)
and
standpoints,
via more errands. Videos (finishing up the Jean-Pierre Ponnelle's 1983 Bayreuth Richard Wagner Tristan und Isolde production), Opus 12 work, and composition page 10 re The Decameron - Fourth Day: II, dozing off -- an encouraging sign that sleep will not be an impossiblity, abetted simply by orange aspirin, a penicillin derivative, and, by the brochure and online resources, what turns out after all to be a circumscribed diet on the liquid and soft side -- with thanks to the wizardry of both friendly-expert dental practitioners.
