Clean Teeth and More

Today’s trip to the dentist for my 6-months cleaning had some unexpected results, in addition to a squeaky clean mouth. You know that feeling when you almost don’t want to eat for fear of undoing all that scraping and polishing.

Since I switched to Larry Bowers, I can truthfully say I no longer dread going to the dentist. I am happy to have left the ceiling-mounted TVs playing CNN continuously behind and instead traded them in for classy artwork with soft jazz playing in the background. Instead of People and Newsweek, there are reading choices such as a bound volume of the last 15 or so years of New Yorker cartoons.

But most of my time there is actually spent tilted back in the dental chair as my patient hygienist carefully scrapes and does whatever is necessary to clean up my teeth.

The first piece of unexpected good news was the fact that instead of berating me for slovenly flossing, for the first time in 59 years I was told that I was doing a good job. It undoubtedly helps to have straight teeth. But I must say that was a small victory and a reward for attentive flossing.

When I asked her what was new in her life, she said “Tap dancing.” We talked about her 10-week course with Fairfax County Rec Dept, of which she has taken the first class and loved it. All people about our age, including the teacher. Not too fast. Doesn’t assume you know squat about tap dancing. Does this sound perfect?

I have been looking for a class that fits this description for the last 2 years since I visited my friend FL in FL, where she took me to a tap dance class that indeed made us feel young. The instructor of her class was in her 80's I believe. The class cost something like $2. And it was the most fun I had had in a long time as we shuffled and brushed and turned.

But then I came back here and was greatly disappointed by my one attempt to join a class of 20-somethings. I couldn’t keep up, my knees hurt, and I felt OLD.

So today I came home and rumaged through my closet to find the tap shoes I had purchased and worn once. Thank goodness my latest clean-up spree hadn’t sent them to Value Village.

By DC standards this class is a bargain at $80 for 10 classes. I will show up on Sunday at 3:00. I will definitely enjoy this chance to talk to my hygienist without having my mouth wide open.