Original Thought

Hey, remember how enthused and appreciative I felt towards Google the other day?

I’m not sure that I feel awesome that Google is fostering a global connectedness to all other human beings, or not, but the other day, I decided to look up a question that had sort of bothered me since I added an oral rinse to my dental regime.

For those who don’t know about my amazing teeth, they have always been crooked, crowded, snaggly, but cavity-free. Cleanings took half the time of mere mortals, and in my twenties, my every-five-year dentist habit was met with disapproval, but a grudging, “you have good teeth”. Apparently, I have been overconfident, though, as my last trip to the dentist was terrible. The cleaning took forever. It hurt. And they found two occlusions. Now, to be fair, an occlusion is just a pre-cavity (so my record stands!), but they booked me for fillings. I showed up, ready and a little nervous, and they offered me the needle.

"Um, do I have to?" I asked. "I don’t like needles."

"You know what?" he said, “It’s just a small one. You probably don’t need freezing.”

Great!

OH MY GAAAAAAAAAHHHHSHHHHH. (the sound of me trying to yell with three hands in my mouth.) Apparently, I do TOO need freezing. And also, apparently, Marathon Man made far too big of an impact on me, as that’s all I could think about, despite trying to visualize nice rippling brooks over smooth river stones.* I was tense, sweaty, and it took 40 minutes to do, since they had to keep stopping so I could start breathing/stop whimpering again. No good.

“We’ll book another appointment for the other one.”

Boooo.

Two weeks later, I show up, already shaking and panicky. I asked for the Mouth Needle this time.

“It’s just a small one. You probably don’t need—"

“Give me the damn needle!!!!”

Without living through it again, my hands were clenched together, my eyes were closed, and I held an isometric glute contraction for a full 15 minutes. Then….

“All done.”

One eye slowly opened, then the other.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“That was… (long pause)… fine.” And I meant it. No pain, at all. Even the needle part was fine. What a nice dentist! From all the tensing and worrying, though, I was super-shaky, and had to sit in my car for 10 minutes before I could drive.

But I digress. Two (not really) cavities, two stressful chair sessions, and you-bet-I’m-buying-an-oral-rinse, so that I can add to my regime of flossing, brushing, and having Good Teeth.

Which brings me, finally, to Google. I started to type a question about the aforementioned oral rinse. I noticed that, when I spit, there are lots of blue... things... that come out. So, I started typing, "what is the blue stuff that I spit out when I use mouthwash?" and the darn thing auto-completed it for me! Not on the first word, but still.

I'm torn between being reassured that there ~~are millions of others~~ is at least one other person out there who has the same questions, the same inquiries, the same concerns... and being slightly depressed that there is nothing that I can come up with that somebody else in the world (actually, in the English-speaking, computer-accessible world) hasn't already asked. I tried.

In fact, without even trying, I read this the other day:

"Uniqueness, when it comes to human experience, is a fiction we tell ourselves. Maybe in combination the elements of your life amount to something one-of-a-kind, but you can be pretty sure that each of the elements is something someone has owned, done, claimed, crowed about before. So you can drive yourself bonkers trying to hunt down elements that are at least unique to your FB feed, or you can decide that your experience has value in its value to you." - Carolyn Hax

Again, reassuring that I'm not alone, but great, even my unique thoughts about uniqueness have already been uniquely thought and written about. So, never mind, I guess?

Bleah. Pass the floss.

* Come to think of it, the laughing brook thingy didn’t work during labour either. Maybe my choice of visualization is the problem.