A Hole Lot of Effort

The time came a few weeks ago when I had to undertake that task which befalls us all some stage. I tried to shimmy out of it. I kept putting it off and putting it off and putting it off. I tried to convince myself there was nothing wrong. But eventually, I knew I was living in denial. I knew the time had come. So I called up the dentist and I made an appointment.

That was three weeks ago. Today I went back for the second time to have two fillings done. Oh delight.

I've had a fair amount of fillings in my time. There's a few reasons for this - I sucked my thumb as a kid, I have acidic saliva, whatever. Getting a filling is pretty standard when I make a trip to the dentist. Another hole? Fill 'er up.

It's kind of crazy that a cavity, something the size of a pin prick, takes so much effort to fix. There's a whole dentist tool belt required just to fill one up. There's squeally drills and vibrating drills and drills which feel like they're digging a trench right down to your gums. There's the sucky tube and tweezers and pliers and God knows what else, poking and prodding around. You'd think they were filling in a pot hole, let alone a cavity.

It would be so much easier just to let it go, wouldn't it? Just to let the cavity exist and even despite the pain, go along existing with it. I mean, that's what we do with every other aspect of our lives. We know there are holes in our relationships, holes in our confidence, holes in our self-esteem, holes in our happiness. We've got all the tools to fill them up, to smooth them off and to move on in a state of completeness, but we don't.

Because after awhile, we start to like the shape of them. They become familiar to us. They become a part of our identity and filling in the hole would make us feel different. Complete, yes. But not necessarily any better. The holes claim things and cause things and make us angry and frustrated and sad, but despite all the pain they inflict, filling them in would be more painful. Filling them in means change.

I write this with a fat lip. A lip so fat I feel like a walrus. I caught the train home with a hundred hot men and I wasn't able to smile at any of them because my cheeks were too numb to show any emotion. I have a sore back from the dentist chair and am not allowed to eat for another hour. And, while I may no longer have a cavity in my tooth, I now have a huge cavity in my credit card. Everything about this situation sucks and is proof that there's nothing worse than filling in holes.

Alice in Wonderland sure would have turned out differently had they filled that rabbit hole in with cement.

Ciao for now. xo