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Dental pain is good evil
Rejoice Ngwenya
February 23, 2012

It is just over a week after Valentine-s Day, when I returned from a rare sojourn with my dentist. The adage 'be cruel to be kind- must have been conceived with these 'tooth artisans- in mind. I mean dentists just love inflicting pain on other beings for what? - just to make one-s smile brighter! If the United Nations has outlawed torture, why are these masked gladiators allowed to roam free in medical practice? And we actually pay for this self-immolation!

Lying on the retracting sci-fi table and anxiously staring at the intimidating light made me wonder why sensible parents express love to children by letting them choose such pain-inflicting careers. I am glad my son is off to Europe to study medicine. Had he chosen dentistry, I would offer him for adoption with a primitive, childless octogenarian couple deep in the Amazon Jungle!

But then not all evil yields bad situations. Listening to the airotor and syringe assault my gums as tears trickled down my cheeks; mouth paralysed by the lidocaine; I was struck by a brilliant eureka, post-Valentine idea! I am thinking: the restive middle-aged man, whose life is tormented by a youthfully mischievous teenage girlfriend or by that perennially ungrateful estranged wife - come to my Temple of Good Evil for free Valentine or Birth Day gift advice. You want to exert a measure of revenge on an ungrateful girlfriend or that wife intoxicated with a sense of lustful, extractive allegiance and crude entitlement? - offer them a fully paid-up frolic to your dentist. How much more good is evil than my maxim: "restore your disarming smile, sweetheart - get tortured by my personal dentist!"

Her 'Cupid-s Agony- would begin with having to scrounge for scarce parking amidst stares of bemused 'money dealers- accosting her with offers for Rands and US$. At the doctor-s reception, the youthfully mischievous teenage girlfriend or perennially ungrateful estranged wife is made to wait anxiously in the lounge, subjected to an old Zimbabwe Television documentary on mosquito romance. Preferably, give her a derelict 1996 volume of 'Living and Loving- boasting a lead story of Michael Jackson allegedly dating Elizabeth Taylor!

On the retracting torture table - never mind the vulgarity of lying on her back under the scrutiny of a masked male dental assistant with prowling, predatory eyes - the dentist forces a cheek retractor into her mouth, just enough to stem her nauseating nervous chattering. By the time the notorious dental 'chisel family- of hoe, angle former and cleoid-discoid have done the rounds in her mouth, she will be - sort of- gratefully cursing you subconsciously. It-s too late; my dentist is already possessed with the Avenging Spirit of the Snow White Tooth!

I would savour that moment when the dentist 'massacres- her decaying molars with an over-sized spoon excavator. If her cavities were anyway as deep as mine, nothing will give me more pleasure and subdued satisfaction than imagining the dentist ramming that amalgam even when the anesthetics has not taken full effect! As your youthfully naughty teenage girlfriend or perennially ungrateful estranged wife finally emerges from 'Cupid-s Pain-, send her an 'I loved you darling- SMS text. Reassure her that you have just had a 'Temitope Balogun Joshuarian-type- prophesy that her smile, in not-too-distant-a-future will disarm Denzel Washington or better still lure a divorced Tiger Woods to her FaceBook page! After all, your youthfully mischievous teenage girlfriend or that perennially ungrateful estranged wife may condemn your Tooth Artisan as a purveyor of agony, but I still insist dental pain is necessary evil tinged with good intention.

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