I wake with a start, and my eyes snap open. The clock reads 4:11. For the next hour or so, I toss and turn and toss some more. In my mind, music from The Doors’ “The End” is playing and scenes of the jungle being blown up in Apocalypse Now are flickering.
“This is the end [Boom!], beautiful friend. This is the end [Boom! Boom! Boom!], my only friend, the end.”
Ostensibly, I’m worried about my future. I rise from my bed, go to the dining room table, and compose a letter to a headhunter, which I send into the ether at 5:57 a.m. But really, who am I fooling? Here’s the primary source of my anxiety attack: My root canal is scheduled for this morning.
Truth be told, I’m not even sure what a root canal is, though I’m positive that any medical procedure involving the word “canal” can’t be good. I take to the Party Line. (For those who don’t remember or just don’t care, the Party Line is an email group consisting of me and several of my former sportswriting colleagues.) I don’t know why I find comfort in emailing these boobs during times like this, but I do.
• 6:40 a.m.: “The bell is about to toll for Wild Bill Wagner. In less than two hours, I shall be in a dentist’s chair.”
A little later, a Party Liner responds: “Godspeed, Bilgronymous. Holy shit, this one’s touch and go.”
Indeed.
I noodle around on some freelance work, then return to the Party Line:
• 7:27 a.m.: “He’s a dentist I’ve never used, some sort of root-canal specialist. I’m sure he’s a butcher.”
• 7:29 a.m.: “I suspect this will be like the medical procedures on Civil War battlefields, where doctors gave the wounded only a belt of whiskey before cutting into them.”
The pre-procedure Party Line theatrics both amuse me and calm my nerves, as I knew they would. Speaking of nerves, the dentist tells me about the ins and outs of a root canal after I slide into his chair: Essentially, he’ll be “plumbing” (his word) inside little canals within my tooth in order to remove infected nerves. It sounds gross, which is why I didn’t want to learn the particulars in the first place.
Before the plumbing can commence, the dentist numbs my mouth with a seemingly never-ending series of shots. This is where things take a turn for the worse. Some people are terrified of flying; others are terrified of snakes. My phobia is needles, especially the massive ones used by dentists.
While waiting for the novocaine to take full effect, I excuse myself to go to the bathroom. “Too much coffee,” I mutter to no one in particular as I stagger down the hallway.
I begin to feel lightheaded as I stand in the john, though I am able to punch out a couple text messages to the Party Line:
• “Gave me five shots. I honestly am about to faint. Crap.”
• “Beads of sweat on my forehead.”
A Party Line comrade responds to my SOS thusly: “Buck up, you flaming Mary.”
I make it back to the dentist’s chair, where I feel compelled to explain myself via another text message: “I have a needle phobia. My Achilles’ heel.”
To which he responds: “Just close your eyes and picture swimming nude with Erin Burnett.”
Somehow that works. The lightheadedness subsides, and I get through the 90-minute procedure with relative ease.
As I drive home, I think about my blog. Now that the big root canal is done, what’s left to write about going forward? There’s always Fluffy, I suppose, but what if nothing interesting happens in his life? I might be forced to write about—dare I even suggest it?—my job search. Nah. What fun would that be?
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