My dad will turn 90 next month. At this age, he is struggling with dementia and is unlikely to recall what he did that made him my instant hero, when I was just six years old.
One day while sitting at home watching TV, I felt a loose tooth. How annoying! How funny! My tongue was curious about its stability and ability to hold onto the lower gumline. It started licking, pushing, and poking that loose tooth until it toppled! Oh no! Did it fall off?
I dashed to the bathroom, trying to stand on a stool over the sink in front of the mirror, which might give me the truth about my tooth. I stepped up and leaned forward to look, and just before I yanked my mouth wide open, my dad whisked by in the hallway. He must have caught me in a clumsy and awkward tiptoe-standing position.
“What are you doing!?” He shouted.
“My tooth! It’s loose!” My outburst got him worried. I clearly sounded like I could hardly talk, a very unusual phenomenon. I could feel that loose tooth moving as I talked, and I feared the worst. What if I swallowed it down my throat? Will I choke? Will I die? What if it stayed that way forever? What’s my plan? Should I pull it out? A million questions flashed through my mind.
“Get Down. Let me see.” Without any fanfare, my father calmly motioned me to follow him to the couch. I was relieved. Dad’s come to my rescue!
I followed his order to sit in a small stool with the back of my head in the empty space between his legs. He gently cupped my jaw with his hands, “Ah, here. It is ready for me to pull it out!” He hurried into his bathroom and came back with a tiny ball of thread, a few pieces of cotton pads, and a small bottle of rubbing alcohol. He told me to close my eyes and said we would count down to ten together. What a smart idea! I didn’t want to look. I just wanted the operation to be done and over with as soon as possible. As soon as I closed my eyes, I felt a thread looping around the base of my loose tooth and a sudden tightening. He began the countdown, and I followed in silence. Once it hit one, the tooth came out! He got it! I felt no pain. He felt ecstatically triumphant!
“Ha, I got it! Here, put the cotton pad wet with alcohol over the hole in your gum”
That was it. It was over. He looked so happy that he could play the dentist and I was his patient. At that moment, he told me about his biggest regret in life. He had wished that he could have studied to become a doctor. Doctors are saints in his views.
“Too late for me to study medicine now. I don’t have the brains. But I can pull teeth! Do you want to be a doctor?” He gave me a straight look with a glint in his eyes.
“I don’t think I can, daddy. I’m afraid of blood….”
My shameless confession made him laugh. He laughed for minutes.
“Ok then, you can’t be a doctor. And I can’t be a doctor.” He kept laughing, and I was amused at how easy laughter came to him. He didn’t have to achieve anything big to feel proud. He just pulled out my loose tooth, and he felt good about himself.
“Next time, just tell me when you have another loose tooth. One by one, I’ll get them out!”
His modest tone betrayed his enormous pride. He became our family dentist who could skillfully remove each and every one of my loose teeth before I turned thirteen. Then one day he said, “Let me know when your wisdom tooth comes out. Your brother had a complication. But maybe you won’t.” Well, guess what? My wisdom teeth never surfaced!! Or if they did, they emerged so quietly that even my tongue didn’t notice. My dad was disappointed. He thought he missed an opportunity to show or test his dental acumen. Little did he know he did do an amazing job with my set of teeth.
“You have a mouth of gold!” That’s what my New York dentist tells me these days, every time after my regular checkup. What would he say if he found out my dad was my stay-at-home dentist throughout my childhood?
As Father’s Day approaches just two weeks before his 90th birthday, I count the countless ways that he has showed up for me, in my moment of panic or despair, beginning with this very first time he became my hero. Taking them out, one loose tooth at a time, he’d prepared me for adulthood. Thank you, dad!