I went to a dentist from an ad. It was pretty interesting.

My tooth was hurting so bad, to the point that I had to actually search for dentists in my area via google. And then I looked around at both the screen of the computer and phone at the same time, so I could write the phone number in the phone. Which I could have done all of that on my phone, but the computer was already open, you see. But it hurt bad as hell, is my point. I found this chain of dentist places, as in like several locations, which is funny. It didn’t look like any dentist website that I had ever visited before. It looked more like Instagram or just something from an ad in the last eight years for candles and bottles of wine. It looked a little like a pink bag they’d put your candles in at a nice store, with a soft cursive logo, real minimal. I was reading their insurance policies and how they go about it, or moreso if they’d be mad if I showed up with no insurance.

An ad for it came up on my phone too so I figured fuck it, I’ll just go there. Seems like they really want me there.

I called the place and they got me in for an appointment the next day which I was extremely thankful for, and still am!

Next day I walked to the dentist’s office. The lobby inside was real soft and pastel-y, like in the ad, just so minimal and simple. I felt like a real idiot for coming here for some reason, like as soon as I stepped in there and realized I was wearing gym shorts and a baseball cap, I just felt so silly (And I don’t mean like you know how some people write how “Oh my god I just looked so unhinged out walking around in my Mossy Oak camo jacket” like that’s just somebody secretly trying to brag about how cool they looked. I mean, I felt really crummy in the gym shorts. Like when you don’t dress formal enough at a formal thing).

There was this real clean guy sitting in the lobby waiting to get his tooth checked out too, I bet. He had on a blazer and slim fit jeans rolled twice at the ankles with those Vans that look more like boots for some reason. He was on the phone saying he had several appointments the next day. That’s so crazy to me. I feel like one appointment a week can be too much sometimes. I definitely would never be making a new appointment knowing there were prior ones.

There was nice music playing. Objectively nice. I didn’t like it but it was nice. I pictured an office of bigwig music producers hearing lo-fi bandcamp type stuff for the first time and going, This is it! This is the next big thing! And then they went and made some music to sell to dentists offices just like this.

I heard my last name spoken from somewhere in the lobby. I got up and followed the voice. A man came out from a hallway and introduced himself as the dentist I would be hanging out with for the next hour. We shook hands and he brought me into a room that looked so clean, like the lobby. Awww! It looked so nice. He sat me in this leather chair that seemed practically only for dental use. There were thousands of these chairs across this great world that weren’t made for comfort, but rather for a dentist to look at you better.

There was an off TV in front of me. I looked at my reflection in it as he typed things into a computer. He told me that I could put on Netflix or some other streaming services if I was getting operated on, like cavity fillings and what have you. He said it relaxed patients. I asked if I could turn it on now. He said it would be kind of pointless, just cause we’re more just talking during this appointment while he takes a look at the affected area, and it won’t really take that long. Kind of just saying no to me turning it on without saying it. He was acting like when people are going No, don’t worry about it, and they wave their hand around and stick their lips out. No, don’t worry about it. He wouldn’t just straight up say NO. It made me want to turn it on more now, just to see if he would actually get mad or be OK with it. I didn’t do it though.

He brought me into a different room and made me put my face into this orbiting thing while I was standing up. Don’t know what the hell that was but anyways.

We went BACK to the other room and he told me how I would just need to get my wisdom teeth removed, plain and simple, and it would make me feel so much better. And if you know me at ALL then you know how much I love to feel better. I got hyper and said let’s get to it!!!

We were chatting about teeth and if I smoke, just having this good little time going over my medical history. I tried so hard to be honest but I lied anyways. I told him I saw a dentist last in 2019 when I absolutely know the last time was in 2011. And I told him I flossed for a year straight in 2015 and then stopped and that didn’t even happen at all.

He reminded me a lot of one of the guys from Queer Eye. Bobby, I think, the paler one who makes your house way nicer, buys you all new furniture, my dentist looked just like that!!! Even dressed like him (dentists here don’t seem to have a required uniform in this place, they just wear what the hell ever).

It wasn’t a great time, really, by the way. I’m being a little sarcastic. I felt like I was making cool light talk and just being myself, but I thought about jobs I had where I took people’s orders, and they’d act in this cool way that made me feel so embarrassed for them. And that’s how I felt about myself just now.

I for some reason brought up dreams. I asked him if dentists had any more insight on dreams about your teeth falling out, like what they were about.

He asked me what? And I explained to him that I feel like I had heard about people always talking about dreams where their teeth fall out, painlessly, but it’s a disturbing enough visual with or without that. And every time somebody tells me about one of these dreams they always put all of their fingers up to their mouths and twinkle them around. And I told him how I’ve heard that it means you’re a bit stressed in life if you’re having those kinds of dreams.

He didn’t know what I was talking about which miffed me a bit. You, of all people, doc, are telling me that you don’t know what I’m talking about? Yeah, I asked him that, too, and he just shrugged his shoulders and was like, don’t know what to tell you. I asked him what he thought about dreams in general, like if they relate to teeth, and he said something about how not all thoughts are diamonds. He was messing with me a bit and it made me a little embarrassed. He was younger than me, too. Which was NOT good feeling.

He smacked his legs with both hands and got out of his chair and told me to walk to the lady at the desk and say that I’d like to schedule a follow-up thing. He patted me on the back as we both exited the room, which was strange, but I also kind of expected it. Two people leaving a room at the same time and then going separate directions is the most common time for a single back-pat to occur.

I talked to the lady at the desk. She asked about insurance. I deflected and said I’m too stupid to have insurance which was being funny but as time goes on it seems like it might actually be true. She didn’t laugh either way. We made an appointment for two days from now. We could have done it that day like right then but it sounded like they were trying to parlay two appointments into one which made me feel overwhelmed. I’d rather be in pain than have to parlay appointments.

I went outside and immediately started walking down the sidewalk, didn’t even wait a second. I opened my phone and started surfing the web. I was looking at peoples Instagram stories. Seconds later an ad popped up for the same dentist’s office. There was a picture of ME, crazy enough, talking with the lady at the desk from ten minutes earlier. I didn’t even see a camera in there. It felt insane to see this, if nothing else just because of how fast they were at ad output. But I was also happy to get a pic to show that I was supportive of the diversity of this particular branch. I was pleased with my experience, mostly.