The Windows of Your Soul

Born with the seeds for teeth, we take them for granted.

Not always so. Mom's parents had few teeth in their mouths from my earliest memory. Papuh had "summer" teeth, as in, summer in his mouth and summer in his pocket. His false choppers were worn out, made a clicking noise, and caused him to whistle when he talked. Granny had neither teeth nor "falsies", but I watched her eat tough fried steak with no apparent loss of efficiency.

I remember my dad having black teeth. Photos of him during that period never included a smile. When he was about 24, he had every tooth in his head pulled. He would go to Dr. Monaghan in Overton at 5AM and have all teeth in the upper half of his mouth pulled. After a few days of healing, he would have the remaining upper teeth pulled, and so forth. Dad had a perfect fit with his store bought ivories, ate well, and SMILED in every photo from that day forward.

Due to the above mentioned family history, I thought I was well schooled on "teeth".

Not so!

My mom-law 'splained to me in great detail this morning how she forms her opinion of others based on their teeth? She mentioned one person who had teeth so crooked they looked like they were throwing up gang signs. She described multi-cavity teeth as looking like dice. And my personal favorite, "He had so many missing teeth, he looked like his tongue was in jail."

She reserved her most vile comments for those unfortunate cretins with brown teeth.

I always heard that the eyes are the windows to the soul. I guess I missed the chapter about tooth color?