Dilemma

Had three appointments with service providers this week, and they went something like this:

The hairdresser parted my wet hair into sections, picked up the scissors and said, “And what are your plans for this afternoon?”

 “Got any plans for the afternoon?” the chiropractor wanted to know, preparing to twist my head off my neck.

“Got anything fun planned for later on today?” said the dental hygienist, adjusting the chair.

And the dentist: “Open wide? Awesome! Ummm...do you have any nice plans for the rest of the day?”

When I mumbled something noncommittal they all, with the exception of the hygienist, asked if I had any exciting travel plans or have been anywhere exciting recently.

I find these questions embarrassing. Don’t these people know that I know how boring they must find their clients’ responses? Do they really think that I am so naïve as to assume they will be fascinated when I tell them that I expect to take a nap the minute I get home, then maybe read a book? Do they think that I have no theory of mind?

But if there is one thing I have in spades, it’s theory of mind. I have so much of it, in fact, that I am often silenced by a too-vivid image of how trivial what I’m about to say will seem to my listener.

 Is there anything more soul-killing than someone nattering on about their schedule? The only being on the planet on whom I inflict the details of my afternoon plans is my spouse of fifty-two years. Ditto for travel plans and stories. Who, aside perhaps from one’s own mother, wants to hear about the bistro in Bogota or the flight to Madagascar?

So when people assume that I do not possess the ability to put myself in their place (something that the normal child learns to do by about age four) I feel patronized and embarrassed.

I wonder why these otherwise capable professionals persist in these inquiries. I’ve been going to the same hairdresser for five years, and for five years he’s asked about my plans for the afternoon, never noticing that every time I deftly shift the conversation to his Labradoodle,  who is in fragile health.

This tiresome practice is probably the fault of some business guru, who came up with the idea that asking clients questions about their schedules and travels would improve their satisfaction and lead to financial success. But that only works if the clients have a strong narcissistic streak, or lack theory of mind.

My hairdresser, my chiropractor, my dentist and hygienist are professionals. I am their client. I don’t need to feel that we are buddies. Why can’t we rest peacefully in our respective roles and dispense with these attempts at formulaic chitchat?

Of course the trouble with theory of mind is that it is just that: a theory. Which means that when I imagine that my dentist would be bored if I told him about a trip I took in 1984, I may be wrong. He might in fact be deeply interested in my story, and feel gratified that I am willing to share it with him. Perhaps he gets lonely, endlessly digging around in people’s mouths while they cringe in anticipated pain, and is starved for conversation.

So what should I do--answer the questions and be found boring, or dissemble and be thought unfriendly?  The horns of this dilemma are sharper than a dentist’s drill. The only solution I can think of is to let my hair grow to my waist, do hours of yoga every morning, and commend my teeth to the Universe.

Saving The Ivories

Just got back from an hour's communion with the spider plant in my dentist's office.  Since I find nothing more boring than talk about teeth--even my own--I will write instead about the spider plant that kept me company while the dentist and his assistant fought the good fight in the tiny battlefield of my mouth.

This was not a spider plant filled with joie de vivre.  It drooped in its hanging pot and was obviously deficient in Dylan Thomas's "force that through the green fuse drives the flower."  It disturbed me because my house is always in danger of being taken over by spider plants.  They ooze vitality and make babies by the dozen, and the minute I put those babies in water they send out thick shiny roots, and then I have to find homes for them. 

Spider plants being famous for purifying the air of pollutants and bad energies,  I wondered if the dentist's plant's failure to thrive was due to the pain and apprehension it was obliged to absorb day in, day out,.  But I'm almost sure that I did not, during my sixty minutes in the chair, personally add to its daily load of negativity.  I was so relaxed that in fact I wrote this entire post out in my mind and thought of a couple more topics to get me through the blogging week.  Plus, I was sending out waves of gratitude the entire time.

I don't like going to the dentist any more than you do, but whenever I'm there I imagine in vivid terms what my life would be like if, as has been the case for the human race during 99.9% of its history, I couldn't go to the dentist--a friendly, clean, well-trained 21st century dentist.  And I am overwhelmed with thankfulness.

In another age, by now I'd be missing a bunch of teeth, some of which would have fallen out as a result of calcium depletion during pregnancy.  But others would have dropped off only after days and nights of the kind of pain that obliterates thought and makes a living creature long for death.  My face would have that sunken look that one sees on witches in fairy tale illustrations, and my few remaining teeth would be crooked, wobbly, and yellow.  I would not be able to eat walnuts, or almonds, or pistachios. 

So I'm grateful that my cheeks are anything but sunken and that my teeth, with the help of dozens of dentists over the decades, are still clinging to my gums.  I'm grateful for the chair that tilts at the touch of a button, the piped in music that matches the blandness of the decor, the face masks, the rubber gloves, and the assistant who asks me if I'm ready for spring.  And I'm grateful for the hard-working spider plant, which looks like it is in urgent need of some spring sunshine.

And now for a negative P.S.:  One thing I am not grateful for is the arm-and-leg cost of all this, which is covered neither by Medicare nor by supplementary insurance.  I am grateful that I had an arm and a leg to give in exchange for having my tooth saved, but it is distressing to think how many people in America can only get this kind of care by sacrificing other necessities of life.

Meditation Comes In Handy

I've been on a meditation tear for the last three months or so, sitting half an hour every morning on the floor in my study, with Wolfie curled up against me and Bisou snoozing on the bed (if I close the door and don't let them in they sit in the hallway and make pitiful sounds).  This is the longest stretch of daily meditation I've ever done, but it's still mostly a wrestling match with my monkey mind while my breath refuses to "come and go naturally."  So I've been going on blind faith that somehow this is doing some good.

Yesterday I went to the dentist to have a crown and a filling replaced.  For an hour and a half (I checked my watch) I sat in the chair with my head tilted down and my feet tilted up and my mouth open as far as it would go--no, farther--while the dentist and his assistant drilled and sprayed and vacuumed and said "bite down, please," and then drilled some more.

I was lying there with my eyes closed and sort of scanning my body for points of tension and then one of the phrases I sometimes say when I meditate popped into my head, "May all beings be at ease," and I said it a few times.  Then it occurred to me how lucky I was to have all my teeth, to be lying with not a twinge of pain while these two gentle people did their best to give me a toothache-free future, and to live in a century when these things were possible.

I was feeling grateful and dreamy and as though there were three of us working on the crown and the filling:  the dentist, his assistant, and I.  During a break in the drilling I heard him mumble into his mask something ending in "...so relaxed," and then the assistant laughed and said "If she were any more relaxed, she'd be asleep."

At the end, when she was putting in the temporary crown, the assistant said "It's so much easier to work when the patient is relaxed.  How did you do it?"   I hesitated whether to tell her the truth, but I finally said I meditated.

"I've read about meditation," she said, "but I always think my mind would be thinking about all the things I've got to do."

"Oh, don't worry about that," I answered.  "It happens to everybody.  It's just monkey mind."

She gave me a look, and then said "Be careful when you floss on that side.  You don't want to pull your temporary out."