Snaggle Tooth

I used to have beautiful teeth. What happened?

When I was in high school in Frankfurt, Germany, a GI that I met at a drama club at the US Army base invited me to audition for a movie on dental hygiene. My mom was skeptical. She and her good friend Patti waited in the snack bar while I attended my “audition.” Nothing came of it, and I never saw that soldier again. But I basked in the certainty that my teeth were show worthy.

Somehow, with the passage of time, my mouth has become reconfigured. Now I have a front tooth that’s turned half sideways and sticks out like a sore thumb (oops, bad cliché), er, draws attention to itself in an unbecoming way.

People who take my picture keep urging me to smile. No thanks. I’d rather wear a serious contemplative look that shows no teeth. Better yet, don’t take my picture at all. I break cameras. The me that shows up in the photo bears no resemblance to the elegant, confident real me. Who is that aging hag? She looks vaguely familiar, but I don’t recognize her.

My mom once offered—when I was in my fifties!—to pay for me to have orthodontia. Ouch, mom! I hadn’t known I looked so bad. My sister’s brother-in-law, a dentist, whom I encounter rarely but enjoy very much, right away on our last visit suggested I have my dentist file down the portion of the incisor that drops below the natural line of teeth. Ouch, again! I’ve been reasonably happy just being me, not feeling I needed to be “fixed.”

Well, I’m holding out on all suggestions regarding my teeth. The truth is, I DON’T CARE. I work out of my home, hidden most of the time from public view, and content to look the way I do.

That’s what being 66 buys me. A little peace of mind.