I was at the dentist yesterday, getting drilled on. It took 3 different shots in my mouth to get me numbed properly. The last one I said “oh my gosh! I felt that in my eye!” The dentist giggled at me and said “don’t worry, your eye won’t go numb.” Yet it did. Halfway through drilling, my eye started to twitch uncontrollably and it went numb. We all kinda laughed about it, no harm- no foul, but funny.

I also decided, as I was being drilled on, that I could never be a dentist, or a dental assistant. I’d just get totally creeped out by simply watching a tooth get destroyed by a drill. I’d like to think most people I know are the same way. I have nightmares of losing teeth, or loose teeth, and someone later told me that the dreams are “Ancestral Recall”… you know, like the magic card. As a species, losing a tooth or a few teeth meant starvation and death. Human instinct. These Dentists lack it. I’m not sure if they learned to get over it, or they were never born with it.

They’re kinda like people who work on dead bodies. Instinct would kinda tell us to STAY AWAY from a dead body. It probably means danger to yourself, disease, grief, and any other number of things. I think these people might lack a basic human instinct, too.

So last week, I picked up this dude who was hanging out with some panhandlers.  He had changed his destination from a hotel to his home, but “didn’t remember” his address, only knew the cross streets. I said that was fine, but I’d need cash up front if he didn’t have a solid destination address. He handed me $100 bill, I’m thinking to overcompensate for something.

On the way to his “home” he tells me that he’s a funeral director for one of the local funeral homes, the one nearest to the address we’re headed to. He tells me he’s on his way to Colorado the next day for a wedding he doesn’t want to go to. He tells me he has a long sad story he’d like to share with me, but instead asks me questions about myself. I let him know my mom passed last month, he gives appropriate condolences.

When we get to his house, he asks if I’d like to come in and smoke some pot, and that he’d let me keep the $100 if I did. Lights and buzzers go off in my head. As much as I need $100, and despite this being my last ride, I tell him I don’t get off work for another 3 hours and that I can’t do that sort of thing. He pushes hard for it, but I say I can’t do that while working.

He’s a freaking funeral director, he was hanging out with panhandlers (who he probably bought the pot from, and who i recognize from bad situations downtown), he didn’t “remember” his address, he’s LEAVING TOWN tomorrow… This all adds up to him killing me while I’m stoned. I found it a small step from handling dead bodies to creating dead bodies, especially while rationalizing it at 3am. He still tipped me about $7, but I refused to get out of the cab. He seemed pleasant enough, but so do pedophiles when you first talk to THEM.

So! Lesson: Don’t trust people who don’t have basic human instincts. Like dentists. My dentist was nice, but then she turned around and charged me $500. Lesson learned.