Powerwash and Empowerment

Since I returned to the city after a week and a half of lounging, eating, and sunning at the Delaware Beaches, I have experienced two things, in the past two days, that I have not yet been able to add to the list since my debut in the city almost 9 months ago.

A dental hygienist “powerwashed” my teeth this evening, and last night joined a group of six other women to discuss the ongoing sources of frustration for women, in the workplace, in social situations, and of course in the world of men. The words exchanged during dinner are, right now, still churning in my mind but I do hope to give them their time in the limelight soon enough.

But setting the latter aside, tonight, after work, after 5:00pm, I went to the dentist. This felt automatically strange due to the fact that for the entirety of my twenty-three years I usually went to the dentist in the morning, and most certainly did so between the hours of 9:00am and 2:00pm. Having my last routine cleaning slightly, well a few months, more that six months ago, I explained my situation while looking into the eyes of dental assistants wondering “doesn’t she know, every six months?!” But being cavity-free since birth I felt as if I did have a bit of breathing room.

Nevertheless I prepared myself for the cleaning, the scraping of the fine-but-rigidly-sharp-feeling-metallic-toothpick-device against my skin, the irritation of my subjectified gums, and that shuddering chill that I feel even now recalling the mere thought of such an episode.

“This tool will use a lot of water,” she said, “so be prepared for a shower.”

“A shower?”

I couldn’t even respond before all of a sudden this small jet stream of water rushed out onto my teeth and gums, tearing miscellaneous plaque and other consistencies which I will most respectfully, on your behalf, exclude from this description.

This hygienist is powerwashing my teeth, I think to myself. Powerwashing my teeth. I was absolutely stiff in the chair, awkwardly positioned with my back fully extended, toes pointed, leg muscles flexed and tightened. Bracing myself for god only knows. Only after I became accustomed to the sensation in my mouth and the spray of watery mist forming the pair of safety goggles smashed on my forehead did I, and most embarrasingly I might add, realize what I may have looked like.

This "cleansing" took 10 minutes. No bleeding, no pain. J ust a sting or two when I actually let my tongue relax back into its intended resting place. After a quick polish to follow and then and a check-over from the dentist, I found myself sitting more complacently in the chair, blushing accepting the dubious title of the patient “who is really boring, and has teeth whiter than the dentist.”