You're so vain...

One thing that my brother and I always could agree on was that we hated something about our appearance. It wasn't that we had unhealthy self-esteems about it or anything: I mean how can someone sporting an 8 inch flat top haircut (Elliott) or Nike Sign shaved in the back of his hair (me) not be self confident... No, it was our jacked up teeth that we didn't like. All through our formative years, Elliott and I had buck teeth that we thought the world noticed everytime we opened our mouths. In my opinion my grill looked much like what you see before you above.

That was until we decided to do something about it. Upon graduation from college, it was a time for a change so we went to a professional. Our dentist, who happened to be close family friend, promised that he could take care of the problem, but it would be an interesting process. And oh, it was...

The first thing that he had to do was to make it possible for my teeth to come all the way together through oral surgery. In the words of Bill Cosby, "In the dentist chair I found that if I lost both of my legs, I would be able to walk down the street by rythemically flexing my rear end!" Dr. Broom had to take that long needle that they shoot you with whenever you have a cavity (come one, you know you've had a cavity!) AND STUCK IT IN THE ROOF OF MY MOUTH!!! I'm not kidding! I think he touched my brain with that thing, and oh I felt it! If you are ever in the dentist office and he says, "David, now, I'm not gonna lie, this is going to hurt, If I were you, I would grab both of those arm rests and hold on! I'm serious David." Then believe him...
At the conclusion of this awful experience I was fitted with not braces, but BRACE. The dentist, I think in order to humiliate me as much as possible, put a brace on each of my front two teeth, but not on any other tooth. He said that this was to pull the two together. I don't know if he thought it was because I was black or what, but my dentist told me the following:
Dentist/Torture Artist: "David, you look cool man, its like you've got some, oh what do the kids call it, bling bling on your front two teeth!"



I was not amused.

I then got to spend over 3 months in Thailand (missionary apprenticeship after college) with my bling. It was during that time period, that I then regretted making so much fun of all of my friends that had braces for years. I think that braces are like the gustapo for your mouth; Mean terrorists, who confine you to a metal cell and deny you all of the food that you most want to eat. During my time in "prison" I completely forgot the wonders of Carmel, Gummy Bears and Gum.
The first thing that I did when I flew back was go to the dentist to get them removed and get my teeth finished.
At long last Elliott and I had what he called "White People Teeth!" We were both so excited except...
Now I have to keep going to the dentist so my "W.P.T" don't fall out and I had no idea how annoying it would be to have to wear a retainer to bed every night, FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE.