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Some Days Are Better than Others
Unfortunately, today wasn’t one of the better ones
You’ve already heard about my love of dentists and too many visits lately. Add another one. How the hell do you break the root of a tooth? The dentist said I just bit on something the wrong way, and it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Ever since I turned 70, my teeth are like rats jumping off a sinking ship. The crowned one looks great, but the rest are now empty spaces where teeth that I used to use are no longer.
And I seem to have lost a brother, too.
When I moved to North Carolina three years ago, I had a string of expenses but not a string of income, so I asked my brother if I could borrow $3,000 to get me through the summer, until I went back to work and could start paying him back. He’d loaned me money before, and I made monthly payments plus one extra at the end as “interest.”
Fall came but no job. I was barely making ends meet, and I texted him, telling him the circumstances but that I would repay him as soon as I could. A few months later, for the first time that I can remember, I didn’t get a birthday phone call from him.
Six months later, I texted him happy birthday. I received no reply.
