A conversation with the dentist

I salute all of you who rise at 6am, daily. This morning I had to do it myself to get to my dentist appointment. I slept shallowly, waking every couple of hours to check the alarm. It reminded me of when we were on vacation and I was desperately afraid we'd miss our train, so I just laid in bed all night and stared at the ceiling.

Boo hoo, Christy. So you had to wake up. Bah.

Anyway. The cleaning went fine, thank you for asking. It was X-ray time and when the dentist came in to interpret the results we had this exchange.

Me: (Opens mouth.) Ahhhhh.

Dentist draws on one of my teeth with a blue pen. Hands me a mirror. He's made this suggestion before; I see it coming.

Dentist: If you like... I can file this one tooth down so it's level with the others. The way you bite... it's wearing unevenly.

Me: How long would it take?

Dentist: A minute. It won't hurt.

Me: You've made this suggestion before.

Dentist: (Shrugs.) I think it'll look better.

Me: Okay. You've worn me down like you're gonna wear down my teeth. (I laugh because I think I'm hilarious.)

Dentist blinks at me... He finishes the grinding, hands me a mirror.

Me: That looks great! Thank you so much. I wonder if my husband will notice.

Dentist: Oh, he won't notice. He's a man. They don't notice.

Me: He will when I bite him.

More blinking.

Dentist: (removes his gloves, addresses the hygienist) No charge for this.