Happy Happy Smile Smile Teeth Teeth

A few years ago, I was on the phone with PG&E. I can’t remember the problem, but it wasn’t a social call. It’s never a social call. Before getting to your problem, they make you go through a little prerecorded dance: address, last 4 numbers of your social security number, etc.  We’re all used to this, but it’s still maddening when they ask you the same questions that you just answered through voice prompts. Even though it’s frustrating, I never say, “I was just asked this.” I want to, but I usually don’t feel like being a dick. Sometimes I am a dick, though. I’m human.

After answering all the questions again, the rep throws me a new one:

“Greg, are you still a chemist?”

“Huh?”

"Are you still a chemist."

“Yes.”

I'm not a chemist, but obviously, I told PG&E at one time I was a chemist. It was a lie, of course.

Fast backward a few years, the same thing happened with Comcast but they asked if I was a carpenter. Sans sounding like a folk song, I said yes, again. Carpenter sounds like a pretty good profession, right?

This morning I had an appointment at Happy Happy Smile Smile Teeth Teeth (HHSSTT). They’re not called that but they really should be. I need a dental implant – specifically, the number 7 tooth -- and, after a consultation with a with a Swedish dental implant doctor on the 26th floor of a high-rise in San Francisco whose office looked like the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles and who charged $11,500 and calls my personal dentist David, I needed to find a cheap-ass place on the ground floor of the suburbs. This place was it. I like my teeth but $11,500 is a bit much and may cause envy amongst the other teeth if I chose to go this expensive route. I can hear them now: "You spent $11,500 on number 7 and you can barely floss me? Come on!!"

 Located in a small office park in the suburbs, it’s the type of dental business that would have a cheap commercial on local channels that ends with all of the staff staged in a horseshoe position in the company’s parking lot, awkwardly waving to an elevated camera -- doctors in scrubs in the front. It’s the type of professional business that everyone warns you about, even the intangible triggers of your body. Regardless, $11,500 for one tooth is $11,500. That’s a lot. That’s a cheap car payment of $200 a month for 5 years and I already had one of those. I needed a $400 tooth or maybe a fancy $1000 tooth. Gold or natural, it really doesn’t matter.

After filling out an online survey asking how dental implants would improve my life, and answering “other,” which followed with a write-in field to specify my answer of “I would stop looking like a hillbilly,” I made an appointment with a dropdown menu on their website. 3 voicemails, 2 texts, and 1 email confirmation later, guaranteeing I would show up, I arrived at the office of HHSSTT. Squat and angular, the building housed 2 other like-minded medical chains -- one boasting bioidentical hormones replacement therapy (huh?) -- and a café in front for employees to get coffee.

Cheap side chairs hugged the walls of reception, interspersed with small, square tables. Curated magazines of Golf Digest, INC., Better Housekeeping, Ebony and, for the kids, Highlights hung from a rack near reception. Reception handed me a thick stack of forms to fill out and I found a seat farthest away from the other three people in reception.

Answering no to diseases, symptoms, and allergies, and mindlessly signing my signature at the bottom of each page, I handed the clipboard back to reception and waited.

A friendly woman in her 20s greeted me. I followed her back to her office where she proceeded to explain what HHSSTT did. It had been 6 months since rogue tooth number 7 went south. In this time, I educated myself on dental implants and had a couple of consultations. So, I was a knowledgeable patient, dropping industry words like “stay plate” and “bone density,” to let them know I was a player.

As she demonstrated the actual process of a dental implant, screwing a hand-sized tooth into a large jawbone on the top of her desk, my mind went muddy. I knew all this: pull tooth, wait, drill a hole and screw-in new tooth. But what I really wanted to know was how much it cost.  It appeared to be a state secret.

She finished her pitch with the price: “$7500…start to finish,” her voice dropping to almost an inaudible volume. Like the other dentist dropping $11,500 bill on me, I looked at her with an expression that conveyed the words “chump change.” When, in fact, my mind was racing with cheaper alternatives.

She left the room while  I watched a 10-minute infomercial on a mounted TV in the corner, promising to be back with a doctor. As the credits rolled, the door opened. A petite woman in green scrubs walked in and introduced herself as a doctor at HHSSTT. She took a seat and paused. She was thinking about something. 5 seconds of silence felt like an eternity. Finally, she blurted:

“So, you’re a semi-professional scuba diver?”

Oh shit, she actually read the forms I filled out. Like writing 911 for an emergency contact, I wrote "semi-professional scuba diver" for occupation. No one ever reads these things, and, if they did, they usually don’t mention it. Asking someone for his or her occupation these days could be perceived as invasive and no one wants to be challenged for being ignorant. So, I figured I was safe. I was wrong. Her curiosity was stronger than her tact.

Like her, I paused and stared blankly. At most, I had 5 seconds to think.  If I perpetuated the lie, I was prepared to say I was training to be an underwater welder of cargo ships and ocean liners. I was impressed I came up with this, even though underwater welder has very little to do with a semi-professional scuba diver. I was certain she wouldn't ask a follow-up question, if I chose this route.

If I were to come clean, I would just say, “Aw no, I was just joking, having some fun.” Or, as the Brits say, “I was just taking a piss. You know.”  We’d all laugh and they would talk behind my back when I left. I assume this happens a lot when I leave.

In the end, I chose to come clean and then add a new, existing lie:

“Awe, no, I was just kidding about the scuba thing. I’m a chemist.”