Nothing freaks me out like my teeth. Once you lose your baby teeth, that's it. Your adult teeth grow in and you never get any more! If you blow it with your teeth, not only do you go through what still resembles medieval torture, but you are stuck with all kinds of ingenious but primitive devices that you have to clean and then stick into your mouth with the oral equivalent of shoe goo. Sure, you can have artificial teeth implanted in your jaw. And this is neat, if it weren't for the fact that they literally screw them into your jawbone. During this procedure, when the dentist says to the assistant, "Drill," he means Black and Decker! Then there is gum surgery, where they take the new gum material from cadavers and put it in YOUR mouth.
I only hope they also balance the blood and bile humors at the same time. And cut my hair.
Every so often my teeth break, crumble, or snap in my dreams. I wake up and run my tongue over my teeth frantically, trying to make sure that they are all there, it was just a dream. It's such a huge relief to find all those very imperfect and somewhat yellowed babies in there. When I asked a psychologist about this, she said that dreams of crumbling teeth symbolize extreme regret.
Maybe. But I think it's more a fear of doing something wrong, than regretting it. Or fear of regretting it, which would inevitably follow doing something you can't take back. I don't think it means you actually regret something, I think it means you are damned afraid you will do something that you can't go back on.
Ask any old person for life advice. Every single old person I've asked has said, among other things, "Floss your teeth. Take care of your gums."
I've got several gold crowns, numerous fillings, but I have all my teeth. Every dentist I've seen has said, "Yes, do not worry, you will keep all your teeth." This is very reassuring.
That doesn't mean I don't worry that I'll screw my life up irreparably. I'm not an ultra-careful person. I'm not an anal-retentive control freak who gauges every move so as not to make a "mistake." I take chances, some pretty big ones! Such as moving 4,000 miles across the US and Canada to Alaska, for starters. However, even a risk-taker like me worries about making mistakes, and I bet that was something you didn't know. I'm only human.
I want my son to pull those gold crowns out after I'm dead and sell the gold. Why should some funeral director get all that gold? It's my son's inheritance! There's enough in there to buy him a new computer, at the least. Hmmm. I need a new computer right now....hmmmmm....