Fuck the tooth fairy (unless you are eight, in which case I apologize)

I went to the dentist today and he told me "Kyle, you've got a secondary cavity under an old filling in your bottom left molar and I'm going to have to give you a root canal," which was great news because the dentist I went to two weeks ago before I left for China told me "Kyle you've got cavities, so many cavities. Boy you've got so many cavities I'm not sure how many you have. Five? Don't hold me to that number. One of them needs a root canal and just to be sure I'm going to drill out the middle of all your molars and pour *Cerc brand ceramic-like goop into those holes and fill them in because you don't need teeth you need very small vases in your mouth. And that's going to cost you 2,800,000 Won.  Also, your gums are too low. I think it best if I perform a gum graft, where just like it sounds like a cut a piece of your gums off, and slap it somewhere else.  You'll need three of those.  You're mouth is pretty fucked. Have you ever thought about fixing the gap in your teeth. Let me show you some pictures. You would be much more attractive. Look at how many very shiny pamphlets I have concerning all these procedures, almost as though I knew everything that I'd find wrong with you before you even came in. We x-rayed you in the elevator. I'll leave you with my assistant so that I can comb some more distinguished grey through this lush inky black quaff of mine. Don't call me an asshole on the way out because we've got sensors for that."

Before we (he) started the procedure today I told him that two friends of mine got cavities filled in Korea and they weren't given enough anesthetic. When they cried out in pain they were just told to be quiet and lay still. I asked for his assurance that this wouldn't be the case today. He just laughed and stuck me with three needles in what felt like terribly slow succession, each one pushed strenuously with a surprising amount of visible effort on his part to get through the muscle of my jaw so it would numb me up into my temple and down into my throat, making swallowing a little tough. They lay a large green piece of felt over my face with a hole cut in it for my mouth and began.

With some things, you just like the familiar. I grew up on pounds of skittles. This was not my first rodeo. Back home though, I am used to having a nice big springloaded plastic "widener" forced into my mouth to comically spread my cheeks away from the work in progress. That intense stretch of the skin away from the gums is comforting. It tells me "all your shit is far away from the drill, and you're not going to get any lose skin caught up and spun around the bit until your bottom lip tears off."  But not here. I opened my mouth wide and the dentist just went in there. I guess the felt would keep me from seeing the blood fly through the air, but the felt slipped so I'd have seen anyway. I repeated the chorus to a song I don't know that goes "I am a rock, I am an Iiiiiiiiiiiiii-land." I told myself that people are tortured in Iran. I sang Leonard Cohen in my head because I saw in an interview with a man that was tortured in Iran that singing Leonard Cohen songs had brought him great peace. When it was over, I was told that I'd have to come back four more times. At the door, the receptionist told me she'd have a Korean name for me by the time I came back on Tuesday. On the bus, I decided to still go bouldering. I practice swallowing, and planned how not to bite myself in exhertion on the rock wall.