Seneca Review Essay by Noah Eli Gordon

Before being fit for braces, the dentist has to make a cast of my teeth; this means he’ll need to insert a mixture of elastic silicone and polyvinyl into my mouth to take an impression of its interior. The dentist doesn’t do this; his assistant does, placing the concoction on a small tray designed to somehow clamp onto my chin and mouth simultaneously. I can think of no more menacing embodiment of pure, unadulterated evil than that of Dr. Christian Szell, the ex-Nazi played by Laurence Olivier in Marathon Man, drilling into Dustin Hoffman’s character’s teeth while repeating like a sadistic mantra the question that now, and perhaps forevermore, echoes in everyone’s head while seated in the dentist’s chair — Is it safe? That this scene has done irreparable damage to the practice of dentistry in the American psyche is undeniably true. Also true is that I saw this film at an age that was far too young to do so. I have a terrible gag reflex. Even now, mornings when the toothbrush reaches those molars farthest back, I gag, have to pause, steady myself a little before continuing. The dental assistant puts on rubber gloves. He leans in. The tray fits. It fits into my mouth. But the rest of me is having none of it: I gag; at twelve I haven’t yet learned how, precisely, one steadies oneself, so this gagging leads to an audible retch, which ends in actual vomit, vomit I expel all over the dentist’s assistant, then the dentist, then myself, and, finally, the floor of the dentist’s office. ø Somehow, miraculously, it works. The impressions are salvaged, and a week later I’m saddled with braces, then tighter braces, then an odd, cumbersome headgear I’ve got to wear while sleeping. At night, the numbers on my clock radio give off an eerie green light, too much light. I cover it with a sock, a T-shirt, whatever’s around and convenient. Sometimes, I read by this light. Sometimes, I just stare at the numbers, waiting for them to change. ø Look, I say to the teller, here’s the deposit slip, here’s the amount and here’s my balance statement. The money’s not there. It’s been like a week now, and this isn’t the first time it’s happened. Okay, she says. Take a seat over by those chairs and I’ll have a banker look it over with you. I repeat my story to the banker. Then to a differ35