I am 43 years old. On the whole, things are good. I have a good job, great friends, I don’t owe any money, although I will shortly owe a lot of money. I am reliably informed that secured debt isn’t quite the same as unsecured debt. But it still feels like a whole lot of debt to me.
This morning I brushed my teeth for only the second time with an electric toothbrush. It’s the cheapest one I could find which had thousands of positive reviews including stand outs such as ‘feels like I’ve just been to the dentist’ and ‘my teeth have never felt so clean’. These are great reviews no matter how you approach them and I am happy to add my own. I think mine is a little more reserved, while remaining enthusiastic about the experience.
You see I am filled with regret. Regret for all of the days, months and years (did I spell those out to fill up a few more words? Probably) years I tell you, when I persisted with a manual toothbrush, telling myself and sometimes others that this was perfectly fine. All the while regularly bleeding from my gums and managing low level anxiety about my teeth all of the time. Whether they be how they looked to other people through to how they felt in my mouth, and the fact I have, as the dentist reminded me, rather a lot of fillings.
A lot of this, perhaps all, is due to my sugary food intake. Again, I have sought to reassure myself, and others, especially my partners that because I don’t enjoy eating lots of sweets that what I am eating, which is a series of sugar-dense foods such as soft-drinks, cake and chocolate is somehow ok. I am here to bear you witness, it is not ok. My mouth is a bit of a mess and after just two days of brushing my teeth with this damnable electric toothbrush the bleeding has stopped, they don’t ache when I brush them and there was no blood when I spit this morning.
Yes, I feel stupid. Really stupid. What else is there in my life where I am equally stupid? I went on a date with a lady called C yesterday. She is smart and analytical. I can see how this might make her life very difficult in some ways and extremely easy in others. We talked about lots of things, but one observation we both made along the way is how frustrating it can be to work with someone who, when shown a new, better method, uses it for the work in front of them before immediately returning to their old inferior method for the next.
I will message her in a minute. While I was brushing my teeth I smiled at the idea of asking directly for her analysis. What did she make of her date and in her opinion should we proceed to another? I will add as a final note that the typing still bothers me, although I am telling myself I have made fewer errors this morning than I did yesterday, albeit still with three fingers. I also have a small amount of pride and satisfaction in doing this twice. Right now this feels like something I will continue to do. It doesn’t take long and you end up feeling great about getting some things down on the page.