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ABSCESSED 11/9/2013 1:55:34 PM
In late October I went to see my dentist, Dr. Gary Leonard, and after X-raying my mouth, he announced I needed a filling in my lower right-side molar and a root canal on the upper molar, which appeared to have an abscess buried deep within.
I would rather not handle the latter, he told me, but your son-in-law is more than qualified. Better call him.
That night I did.
Can you be in Birmingham Wednesday? he asked. Bring the film with you.
I told him I would
Dr. Phillip Faucette graduated with my youngest daughter, Alexandra, from the University of Georgia in 2007, immediately married the aforementioned Alex, and he enrolled in the University of Tennessee Dental School in Memphis in 2008, then at Alabama University at Birmingham’s School of Endocentric Dentistry in 2010 (where he now augments his studies by teaching).
After a night at their lavish apartment, where we had the opportunity to renew our admiration of their young son, Hutson, we took the three of them (four, really — our daughter is jus three months from giving birth to Elizabeth Anne Faucette at Outback, not there exactly there, but at St. Vincent’s near there — it was less expensive to take them to a restaurant of their choice than pay an exorbitant endodonistant’s fee for a root canal), I kept the appointment the next day at Phillip’s office.
Speaking of Hutson, he is a most perspicacious two year old (he is just three months of being three — at eight-two, I am just nine months of being 83 — even so, although I have almost eighty years on him, I cannot be as studiously focused as he is when he is, well, studiously focused.
For example, I once sang (poorly) a Gene Autry ditty called THE SHAMEFUL LITTLE RAISIN to Alex when putting her to bed when she was three. Unbeknownst to me, she also sang the same song to Hutson.
That night I began:
Way out in California, were the sunbeams shine,
A little grape was hanging of a big grape vine,
His Mama said, Be careful, son,
Grape turn into raisins when they’re too well done!
It was there that Hutson joined in — in perfect harmony!:
Shame, shame, the brazen little raisin!
Shame, shame, he’s not so smart;
He’s gonna be part
Of a raisin tart!
S’wounds, not only was he harmonizing, he knew all the words!
A farmer came and tossed him in a great big crate;
A lady raisin met the same sad fate;
The lady whispered, Are you man or grape!
There isn’t any raisin why we can’t escape!
They found a place to exit,
And they rolled straight home;
They found their place
Nevermore to roam.
That is why you will always see
Two raisins hanging where two grapes should be!
Shame, shame, the brazen little raisin, etc., etc., etc.
AND he never missed a word or a beat; what a kid! But we were not through yet: another song popped into my mind, circa 1956. A piece of Irving Berlin drivel called TRUE LOVE, a Bing Crosby/Grace Kelly duet from the movie High Society, a longtime favorite of ours, Alex and mine (in fact, she had had the DJ play it for the Daddy/Daughter Dance at her wedding — it was a highlight).
Hutson joined right in, the words, simple harmony and all:
I give to you and you give to me —
True love, true love —
And on and on, it will always be —
True love, true love!
He was right on, words, melody, and harmony, et al — as though he and his mother had spent hours rehearing it. Irving Berlin would have been proud. I know his grandmother and I were!
The next day I sent fours hours in Phillip’s chair. He even met me curbside with a wheelchair, before and after, in deference to my handicap. It was a totally painless experience — (I slept through most it). My endodontist told me, I do not know if I can save the tooth or not. When you come back for your grand daughter’s birth in three months, we will take some more pictures and see if the medicine I put in the tooth works. If not, either Gary or I will extract it… By the way, you got his phone number? I want to thank him for the, uh, referral.
That Wednesday night at dinner, I inquired where Hutson got his unusual name, and for the first time, Phillip told me the boy had been named after his cousin Benjamin Hutson, a colonel in the Confederate Army.
My only cousin, Douglas Grant, was an FBI agent, Chief of Police, and a law enforcement officer who put many bad guys behind bars — but he was never a colonel in anyone’s army.
Needless to say, I was not named after him.
Robert A. Mills
Copyright. 2013, all rights reserved
