by Louise G. Crawford

Funny thing. I often get a toothache or some other kind of physical ailment when I am in California. I’m not sure why. Maybe being on an airplane does something to my teeth or my ailments are stress-related (not that being out here is stressful or anything). 

Sometimes I arrive with the pain. Other times, it develops while I’m here.

In 2001, I arrived just days after my first root canal. My mouth was throbbing and I was downing pain killers like chewing gum. After a week or so the pain went away, and I was much more fun to be around.

In 2003, we were driving around Oakland, California when I began to feel pain in my mouth. The next morning I woke up with a raging toothache. The pain was so excruciating that I went to see my mother-in-law’s dentist in Tracy. He couldn’t find anything wrong but he agreed to prescribe painkillers and suggested I see an endontist in Modesto.

The next afternoon, we took the freeway to Modesto, home of Chandra Levy and Laci Perterson, and arrived at the endontist’s office just as a blackout was descending on the Mid-West and the East.  "You may want to see what’s going on in the New York," the nurse said when she found out we were New Yorkers. She sat me in the dentist’s chair and turned on the television.

It was frightening to see images of New Yorkers trapped in subways and walking across the Brooklyn Bridge, images eerily reminiscent of 9/11. I had simultaneous feelings of relief and regret that I wasn’t in my city during this latest crisis.

Then the endontist, who was planning a trip to New York, took a look inside my mouth. He banged around with a wooden stick and did an ice test to determine what was wrong with my tooth.

"Root Canal. You’re going to need one," he said confirming my worst fears.  "I can’t start on it on until Monday. Do you think you can make it through the weekend?"

"Uh uh,"  I mumbled while he continued to look inside mouth. I figured I had enough painkillers to get me through the weekend if the pain got really bad. "You can call me anytime," the endontist promised. "I or one of my partners can perform an emergency root canal if necessary."

On the ride home I tried to reach relatives in friends in New York to see how they were doing. Our neighbors on Third Street were having a big potluck BBQ, emptying their refrigerators so the food wouldn’t spoil. My sister and brother-in-law were hunting around for a battery operated radio, my mother was safe Manhattan, and my father and stepmother were coping near Saratoga. Everyone was fine.

I, on the other hand, had a throbbing tooth, the endontist’s telephone number, and hopefully enough painkillers to get me through.

During the weekend, I went with the kids to San Francisco. We did museums, some shopping, cable cars, and other sights. On Saturday I felt fine. But on Sunday I woke up looking like a chipmunk because my cheek was so swollen. I was the classic cartoon version of a person with a toothache. I was popping painkilers every two hours and sipping iced drinks all day feeling relief only when ice was on the tooth. I kept calling the Modesto endontist’s service but no-one got back to me.

I wanted to cry the pain was so bad. Eventually, we returned to Tracy and I took to my bed, writhing and waiting for the morning to arrive.

When I woke up the next morning my cheek was so swollen I couldn’t feel a thing – swelling is nature’s way of saying I’m sorry. I wore sunglasses and a wide brimmed hat tilted so that my cheek wasn’t exposed. My husband took a picture of me when we arrived at the dentist’s in Modesto. Believe it or not, I wanted a picture of this.

The endontist and the nurse talked about their golf game throughout the root canal. But I could care less. The procedure was painless and quick – there wasn’t much feeling left in the tooth.

When they were done, I returned the hat to my head, covered my eyes with dark glasses:  "the movie star from New York look"  and paid the bill (much cheaper than a root canal in Manhattan I noted).

On the way home, my husband and I jokingly decided to do all our dental work in California. "Hey, it’s cheaper to fly out here and go to Modesto for dental work than to do it on West 57th Street."

On subsequent trips to California there have been other toothaches, and last winter an earache had me feeling so dizzy I felt like I was on a sailboat in a stormy sea everytime I walked from one room to another.

And this morning, I heard the phone ring and started to skip toward the kitchen when I felt a spasm in my calf. When it was over, it was too painful to put my right heel down. My muscles was either torn or strained. In either case, it meant pain and difficult walking.

I limped into the bedroom and called my personal trainer in New York who knows a great deal about these sorts of things. "R.I.C.E. Rest, ice, compress, elevate," she said with certainty after I told her about my injury. "And don’t walk on it for a while." She later sent me pictures of ligaments by email.

I lay in bed or on a lawn chair most of the day with my leg propped up on pillows. My husband made a make-shift Ace bandage and kept me in ice packs all day. I can only walk wearing high heeled sandals.

It wasn’t such a bad day afterall. My husband waitied on me hand and foot. I finally finished "Bel Canto" by Anne Patchett, a fabulous book, and I went for a ride in the orange Porsche at twilight, a nice little break from the invalid’s life.