dentists / that’s cold

We’ve been pelted with rain for several days . Yesterday was sunny but the rain has returned off and on today . Predictions seem to be all over the map. Ada gets her predictions from her phone and I get mine from my laptop and from whomever is predicting …….; well , they’re on different planets . Ada says at ten o’clock 100% chance of heavy rain while my site says sunny . Rain will show up later . Or not . The 10 p.m. rain never came last night , postponed until 6 a.m. , but that didn’t arrive until about 9 .

Oh , well . And so it goes .

It’s been cold for us , too , here in sunny southern California , but I won’t mention temperatures . I don’t want the rest of you harping on about how spoiled we are here and how your places are so much colder and you aren’t complaining . And on . Still , for us the air is cold . I’m looking up at the foothills around here and I see snow . That’s a rare event . Oh , snow ! you say . What a baby ! you say .

Ah , well . It is what it is .

We’ve not even gone up to our little A-frame cabin lately . The neighbor from across the road called me and told me that I shouldn’t consider coming up there in my little car until April . He said April . They’re covered in snow . Two feet of the stuff fell yesterday . Maybe the neighbor’s not joking . Maybe April .

Last summer we had extremely hot weather around here . Unusually hot . I was at my dentist’s today and he wished that all of this cold weather and rain might suggest that our summer will be less hot than the last one . Good luck buddy , I was thinking , but I don’t think that’s the way it works . I told him : We’ll see . And left it at that . It was only a bit of official dentist back and forth chit chat anyway .

My previous dentist used to like to talk politics and sports . He presented himself as an aficionado and expert in both areas . It took him years to realize that I disagreed with him on every point he tried to make . Most of my few -and- far-between responses , of course , were limited to a bit of somewhat inhuman grunting efforts because my mouth was wide open and sharp dental instruments were maneuvering around inside my mouth .

He had a picture of The Three Stooges on his office wall , though , so I knew the guy wasn’t all bad . And he was a good dentist , in my opinion , despite his politics.

Ada hated him at first , by the way , but over the years she got to like him . He didn’t talk sports or politics with her . Instead , he discussed his marriage and other personal things with her . He told her to call him Bill . They got to be friends who saw one another twice a year .

I once asked the guy why he decided to become a dentist . He closed the door to the office and lowered his voice . He knew I was a teacher with Los Angeles Unified School District .

I was a math teacher with LA Unified , he told me , almost in a whisper so his partner and others in the office wouldn’t hear . But my wife wanted me to make more money .

The guy did all of his own cleaning , etc. , so that when we went to see “the dentist ” we actually saw the dentist . That’s not as common these days , I think . My present dentist took over the other man’s practice and I see him for a minute or two after the technician finishes the cleaning and the x-rays or whatever .

What does this dentist stuff have to do with the rain and cold weather you ask . Good question .

The cold is beginning to affect my brain —— that could be an answer . Couldn’t it ? Somehow shivering and being uncomfortable makes me think of dentists .

Ah , well ! It is what it is .