From Perfect to not-so-Perfect

Heya Bleedsters!
Many people asking me about Post 2 of my earlier post and frankly, I didn’t know my blog was that popular!! I will definitely work harder to churn it out by this week.
Meanwhile, read this one and tell me if you liked it! Share, comment, subscribe–yada, yada, yada…! This one is made to reflect my past year, or rather one aspect of it. So, enjoy!
Love,
Kunal.

Mr Tall-Guy from Block number 8, Dadar was fortunately a very healthy man.

He was tall, a fact that envied many of his friends. He was slim and fit naturally, which was God’s gift rather than an ‘active person’s’ mark. Every time he ate in plenty, it made him grow taller rather than fatter. He had smooth skin, and a melodious brown skin tone, on the lighter side. He had not many pimples, even though puberty couldn’t resist giving him some.  He wasn’t muscular, either but he didn’t care about that much.

Of course, he wasn’t perfect. If I had to list down all of his imperfections, it would take quite a while.

But the best feature of Mr Tall-Guy was also the most Blessed feature of his. And that feature was his teeth.

Ever since a baby, doctors marvelled at his teeth. His teeth were called perfection by some, nearly perfect by others. They weren’t exactly special, however they weren’t crooked, they shone pearly white brighter than the moon and they could crack a walnut shell when bared.

Child, or grown man, his visits to a dentist were to a bare minimum. And when he did visit a dentist for a mandatory check-up set by his parents, they were short and cute. Cute because the check-up included the doctor staring at the properly aligned wonders in his mouth. The half an hour appointment of the dental check-up would include the dentist, sometimes a man, others a woman, staring down for quite a while, checking each teeth with minute details, as if to find a keed (rot) or cavity.

Of course, after finally giving up, they would give him a warm and big smile and say how perfect his teeth were. He would smile back with modesty, whereas inside his heart would do a mini flip, his mind would play the music of success and his soul would prance like a ballerina.

For years, it was all perfect. The pearly whites now had the ability to reflect anyone and anything. 27 became 32. Tall-Boy was no longer just a boy. He had turned into a Mr Tall-Man.

And as his age struck the 18^th bell, one idiotic Pearly White messed it all up.

It all started during one dinner. As usual, his Pearly Whites helped him tear down a huge chicken whole. He chomped on the chewy naan. He would bite on the meat with all his might. And the teeth withstood everything like soldiers. Not once did they crack or un-align themselves.

But then Mr. Tall-Guy felt something; a small bump on the inside of his gums. What it was, he wondered for days! Perhaps just some kind of a boil that specially appeared in the mouth.

The boil went unnoticed as time flew by. 18 became 19 and the boil evolved into something more. It was growing faster than Mr Tall-Guy’s ego! And finally, a time came when he decided to get it checked.

Ah, the first time he was going to the dentist, knowing that it would not be a mere 15 minute appointment. He sat there with his heart thumping as if he had cancer, and waited as the doctor, this time a kind lady with a generous smile, checked his teeth.

And then she gave him the worst news of all- he had a permanent tooth being born.

He looked at her for a while with a strange look, while his mother paraded questions in front of the doctor. Tall-Guy sat there on that chair with that uncomfortable ‘Doctor’ smell. He thought to himself, All my milk teeth are gone, so why is this a*#h^%e coming to disrupt my perfection?

It turns out, this tooth that wasn’t even straight and proper but instead grew day-by-day horizontally. It was just behind my existing tooth, the perfect one which was supposedly a milk tooth. So what choice did the poor fellow have than to remove this one to make space for the new one?

“So what now, doctor?” asked his mother, worried that surgery might be required. And then doctor sweetly said the one thing he always loathed, the one thing he had judged people for, the one thing that he hadn’t really thought about on himself but now had to….

Braces.

It was one month later and now the Tall-Guy seemed fine. Although his teeth were no longer perfect, his one-year duration of braces were not too bad. He chose to opt for the ceramics, instead of the ugly metal ones. They glistened in his mouth, just as his pearly whites. Hardly noticeable, the new appliance fitted inside his mouth were a pain for the first few days.

The kindest of the dentists that he visited were very supportive and told him that it was normal. It wasn’t embarrassing either, because the ceramics were barely noticeable. It didn’t affect his looks much.

But it did affect his way of thinking.

You might ask how braces can change a person’s way of life. The answer to that is simple: it makes you see the people and their troubles. The Tall-Guy felt the luckiest guy in the world for not having any major health problems all his life. But one day, when braces happened, his world tumbled. He felt miserable, helpless and embarrassed.

However, it also opened his mind a little. All those struggles that other people went through ever since he was a kid, came gushing into his mind. It was as if a filter of innocence had been lifted from his eyes. He saw people going through a lot worse. He realized that perhaps his braces weren’t that bad, when compared to diabetes, asthma, those weird spectacles, and many more horrible illnesses.

It took me a long time, but I finally realized to appreciate what was given to me. To accept what came my way, however it came. What has to happen, will happen and we HAVE to find a way to deal with it rather than question the why.

Thanks for giving this a read. It is from my personal experience and since the blog is tag-lined ‘Randomness of Life’ this post reflects that in every single way.

Also, having braces is not that bad. Better deal with it now that suffer later, right?

As always, if any of it made you smile, laugh, frown or giggle like a little baby, comment share and like! To be up-to-date with my other posts, give a like to my Facebook page and follow on Twitter if you use it! Any images used are either taken from Google Images or from my own personal collection. Contact me if you want it removed.

P.S: You would think that people would get this, but many a times, they don’t! So let me put it out there: I am Mr Tall-Guy.