It’s gotten to the point in my life where all the professional people I have hired, lawyers, doctors and dentists, some I’ve been with for 40 years, are all retiring or selling their practices to the younger ones.
Years ago, when my brother was on the lung transplant list, I was talking to his primary at RI Hospital when he said he wasn’t doing the operation but a colleague of his was, Dr. Veres. “She’ll be here in a minute to answer any questions.” And literally then she showed up right behind me. I turn around and I spot this, what seemed, teen aged girl in a Brown University/RI Hosp dr’s coat with stethoscope and ID badges all over her. I couldn’t stop looking at her face. “You’re fuckin’ 17 years old!” I said to myself. She did look very young for her actual age of 28, but she was a board certified thoracic surgeon. She was more than qualified.
Sigh...it’s not that they’re getting younger, but some one is getting older...me.
**
I will admit I can be a cheap bastard. Every time you step into the marketplace, they’re out to dig as deep as they can into your pocket. If they could convince you to buy a No.2 pencil for $56, they’d sell it to you with no pangs of guilt. So my defenses are up in regards to that.
However, I will spend bucks on things I love and some of those things are expensive. This computer I built is one, it being attached to my stereo system in the other room is another. There are a few thing in this life where the best or at least close to it aren’t negotiable. I will however NEVER buy a current year Mercedes convertible no matter how much I may like, but not love, them. I have to be in love to spend that kind of cash.
Apparently, over the years, my health I can tend to blow off if it’s not an emergency. I seem not to love that so much. Typical male reasoning...huh? Which brings up dentistry and how it can be so damned expensive. I have over the years, since I was a kid, tolerated tooth aches, knowing at times that they can subside, cure themselves if certain conditions are met...and how willing I can put up with the pain and threaten myself with the idea of $3,000 root canals and crowns. It’s a good motivator to do nothing about tooth aches at first.
Months ago, an old root canal/crowned tooth had snapped off as it was over 30 yrs old and the base had eroded. There was no point in rebuilding it as there was little original tooth left. So my dentist, and I, blew it off but with a warning, it will fire up one day. It did last week and this time around, I folded like a lawn chair to get it fixed and didn’t once even try to fight it like some tough guy under torture in a Japanese WW2 POW camp. Fuck, it’s a known fact, even the Nazis didn’t pull that kind of shit Imperial Japan did to POWs.
So why did I cave? An old acquaintance I knew years ago, Marc, had died at the age of 54 last week. I had known him from my party spots around Pawtucket in the ‘90s and early 2000s and it hit me in this way… “Damn, that’s too early. He had it going too, lifetime career at Verizon, probably a fat pension waiting for him when he retired, and god knows what else...all of that ZEROED out in in less than 12 hours.”
Since I have and currently am taking steps to retire, I have learned a few things. One thing you gotta estimate is how long you will live (which is a bitch to do accurately) so you don’t drain all your finances if u manage it to 90. But I have a few facts on my side. All the males in my family bit it young. My mom lasted longer but only by about 20 years. I had also taken the “Live to 100” survey and a few others and with all the info I plugged in, they say I ain’t getting past 80...no way in hell am I...I may even kick it at 69. Or, by a weird outside chance, I live to 101...but I doubt it. This is the best guess they can do. So I work with that.
So, I’m sitting there all day Thursday, eating enough ibuprofen to nearly fuck up my liver but it does shut down that screaming hot, bone pain and fighting it mentally as well as I can and then I start thinking of Marc, who left us at 54. And I also hear an old co worker who always said, “Hey, you can’t take it with you! I want to travel all over Portugal and the Azores...blow it on that!”
I got perhaps 10 years or perhaps a few more to last (Hell? Next week?) and I think, Fuck this; I’m not going to be the tough guy if I can puss out and stop this pain. I got the damn money for Christ’s sakes even if I’ve blown my entire 2025 Delta Dental budget. I will pay cash for this! If I don’t have to suffer...why the f should I? What? To prove to myself I can tolerate shit storms thrown my way? I’ve prided myself on dealing with some annoying crap in my life, like we all have, but Jesus, what if I can avoid it? Hell, run screaming like a little girl the other way if I can!
**
The Dragon Lady
Remember I said my old professionals are quitting?
I’m lying there in the dentist chair and I hear… “Hello, I’m Dr Aiko Takahashi...Nick is selling me his practice and I’m taking on all of his old patients but it’s a slow transition so no worries! OK?”
She, maybe 30, looks at the Xray and says, “Wow, that root tip is really infected...see the shadow in your jawbone? That’s where it’s spreading, bet that throbs like all get out! That tooth will have to come out!”
I look at her, with her tiny Asian body frame with equally tiny, reed like arms and wonder how she can dislodge a tooth? Every other dentist that took teeth out of my skull had the arms of mechanics. She needs a silk kimono and not scrubs to complete the racist image I have in my head.
So after she numbs me up like a board, she starts. I have had teeth out before and the routine is like this: Nothing but massive pressure on the tooth as they push and pull on it. You know there is success when you hear the tiny fibers which anchor the tooth to the jawbone start ripping, you can hear it….a good tearing sound. Then...this wonderful taste of blood and bone as they lift it out. 18 hours later, I feel nothing. No throbbing. No screaming hot pain...nothing.
Good. One thing money is good for is to mitigate life’s shit that gets thrown your way. I hope not to keep repeating these health episodes though. I much prefer spending $$ on a giant Fisherman’s Fry plate which is loaded with fried every thing from the sea. That...is much more fun and I can do it as long as I am moderate about it…instead of ordering off the heart healthy side.
“You can’t take it with you!” Finally I am getting the point of that message. And if you’re curious, Living to 100 calculator...Living To 100
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