You don’t hear a lot of songs about people going to the dentist
and that’s odd because everyone does it and it can cause a lot of tension
it’s scary and sometimes painful and you get a guilt trip about flossing
and there’s vulnerability in the surrendering of your bodily autonomy

I’ve had not one but two dental offices investigated for fraudulent behaviour
one guy lost his license to practice but the other is still doing dental procedures
it’s the clinic at York Lanes in Toronto so if you happen to be a patient there
I suggest finding somewhere else, they’ve got a bad reputation and it’s deserved

So confession time, after York lanes I was pretty done with all of it
I said to myself 'life is short and I feel fine and I really don’t need this shit'
that was in 2011 I remember it was during Occupy Wall Street
there was a camp set up in St James Park and I went down though I couldn’t talk because of the freezing

And since then I just didn’t go to a dentist
some part of me knew it was a bad idea but the anxiety was too intense
and if I tell you about my York Lanes root canal you’ll understand what I mean
let me see if I can do in one stanza, but if it takes two please bear with me

I said I was nervous so they put me under for the procedure
I was supposed to breath into a mask and count down as I got sleepier
but by 4 I still felt pretty alert and I said so and they panicked
and gave me a much higher dose and then I really crashed
I honestly thought I was dying, everything went deep black and still and silent
I remember trying to wrench myself back into consciousness cos I wasn’t ready to bite it
next thing I knew, some time had passed, and I was sitting in the chair
and the hygienists were talking among themselves, I hadn’t died, I was still there

But they were saying some really weird stuff and to this day I don’t know if it was real
one said to the other 'oh my god there’s so much blood, is this normal?'
the other replied 'I don’t know I’m not a hygienist I work at the pharmacy down the hall'
look, maybe I hallucinated all of this, but man it didn’t make me feel good at all

So maybe now you understand why it took me so long to venture back to that scene
in fact it took until I was munching on some bread in 2020 and I broke off a piece
not of the bread but if my tooth and now I had no choice
and right in the middle of the pandemic, man at this news I did not rejoice

But listen, I’m home right now, my mouth is frozen, and I’m laying in bed
and I’m ok, I didn’t die or hallucinate and I’m not even that upset
so this is the story of what a difference a good dentist can make
so if you’re a good dentist and you’re listening, thank you for what you do, it’s truly great

At the start we chatted a bit and I mentioned being nervous about the virus
turns out, he’s a leukemia survivor and his immune system is suppressed
right away I’m thinking shit this guys in more danger than me, is he ok?
and we talked about it and shared our concerns and I gotta say
it was weird to be consoling and reassuring the person who a few minutes later
was gonna be shoving needles into my mouth and drilling into my tooth like some deranged tooth slayer
but he wasn’t deranged, he was a really thoughtful dude from Ireland who was interested in my book
we talked about the residential school system and indigenous reparations while the local anesthetic took

He told me he was disappointed about Justin Trudeau and as my mouth froze I said I know what you mean
but as I argue in the book these parties are pretty similar and that’s how it’s always been
the words didn’t come out very clearly but I could tell he was taking it in
while at the same time assessing whether it was time to put a clamp around my tooth and start clearing out my dentin

The dental assistant gave me a pair of sunglasses since I was staring at the light
they were great big wraparounds, the kind that were really big in the 1990s
imagine what kind of absolute asshole I must have looked like in that dentists chair,
jaw clamped open, face half frozen, Ken Griffey Jr sunglasses and thinning hair

But the dentist kept treating me with respect and dignity, explaining each procedure without condescension
even though he knew I couldn’t answer and there was a limit to my comprehension
the music on the radio was not good but it was definitely inoffensive
and at one point the assistant caught herself tapping two dental instruments together to the rhythm section

Don’t get me wrong, none of this was fun and I still had a pretty tight grip on the face mask in my hand
and I was sweating profusely, the AC unit was broken but I doubt that was the only factor
and I don’t like needles so getting several of them jammed into my mouth
is about the last thing I would ever want and I can’t tell you how glad I am that I’m out

But that dentist was remarkably kind and human
he was from Ireland but he’d lived here for years and I only noticed his accent when his said the word 'tooth'
which he pronounced as 'tuth' and it turned out we had a mutual friend and he also teaches at the u of t
so we had a lot in common and the whole experience really put me at ease

I’m not some corporate shill and these songs aren’t a billboard so no, I’m not going to share the name of the clinic
I’m writing about this strange human experience of having another person do work on you that is delicate and finicky
and how in those moments of vulnerability the way we are treated matters so much
I was so anxious this morning and now all I can think about is that I can’t wait to eat some lunch

Just like in every profession there are obviously good dentists and bad ones
my sister has worked in a couple of dental offices and she’s definitely seen that entire spectrum
but dental work is care work so if you’re a dentist please, be a human being
and take good care of the idiot in that chair, no matter how frustrating they are being