THE FIRST THING I NOTICE ABOUT my new dental clinic is that it is tranquil. Indeed, it has the same quiet purpose that graces a well-run funeral home. All is serene. And perhaps permanent.

True, the illusion fades a bit at the sight of computers staffed by pleasant women, and there is no man in a black suit. But there is harmless music and unobtrusive decoration. And in one clinic that supplied me with a root canal, there was a wall of water streaming through the lobby.

It is not by chance that I link dentists with mortality, for I come from that age in which a visit to the dentist was a time of fear. And with reason. (While all my recent trips to the dentist have been stressful, not one has caused me pain.)

When I was a child, perhaps six years old, my mother took me to my first dentist and I knew right away that nothing good could come of letting someone push sharp implements into my mouth. Worse, he told me I had one small cavity and he could deal with it without freezing and just a touch of the drill. My god, a drill. A hole in my head. A high-pitched whine.

True, the pain was minimal, but the fear was monstrous. And I knew that drill could slip off the tooth and tear through my jaw and only stop when it hit my shoulder. Not good. I got out alive; but, after that, my course was set. Whenever I had to go to the dentist, I demanded freezing. And when I got into high school and away from parental supervision, I stopped going – except when forced by circumstances.

For example, I ran into a rock and knocked out a front tooth. I could not hide that from my mother, and off I went. Then, a puck broke a tooth in half and, once again, I went to the dentist. The first time, he gave me a plate; the second time, he looked at me and said I could go through life looking like a tough kid and he sent me out of the office smiling with my half tooth.

And for maybe five years, I never went to the dentist until a football player stepped on my head in high school and several molars cracked about in my bottom left quadrant. The dentist remarked that my teeth were in poor shape. But he removed various pieces of molar and sent the bill to my parents and I never saw him again.

Until a waterski tow rope snapped into my face and sent my plate to the bottom of Lake Simcoe and cracked up a selection of teeth. So, I had to get a brand new tooth and say goodbye to a mouthful of molars (well, two). This time, I skipped freezing and had a good time with nitrous oxide.

I never went again. Until my right chest filled with pain and I decided that my teeth were leaking pain down my jaw and neck and into my chest. I knew both that I had to go to another dentist and that I better keep this pain theory to myself. What to do?

Luckily for me, I worked in a job that entitled me to a researcher to answer questions. So, I thought of who could be the person I knew who had the biggest possible ego and thus be mouth proud. “Find me Pierre Berton’s dentist,” I told her.

I went to that dentist with confidence and still in a funk of fear. But he always gave me freezing and he never drilled though my jaw. And the one time he used the bumbler on my tooth, I lived through it.

(Yes, I may be imagining that my dentist actually called one of his tools the bumbler. But that’s what it felt like.)

Keep smiling.

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