In our increasingly controlled world, the weather is one of those things we cannot control. I graduated from dental school in 1996 and along the way I’ve had to keep up with the latest technology, theories, and techniques because dentistry, especially pediatric dentistry, has changed so much. School for me has never stopped, the sanctioning body that allows me to practice medicine requires me to take a fair amount of Continuing Education every year. There’s “controls” that govern my day and my office practices at every turn, and my chosen career isn’t the only one like that. Many of the moms and dads, aunts and uncles I have met have similar controls in their careers.
Think about how much control is in your own life. Traffic lights, taxes, department of agriculture stickers on the gas pumps, signs on doors, banking hours, department of transportation approval or NHTSA approval on the car you drive. We are grateful for much of this, some of it we are not.
When a storm like Helene comes barreling through our lives, snapping trees, cutting off life’s luxuries, much of that control is upended. Our power at the office was out for five days as was the power at my, and your home, and one might think this breakdown of life’s controls would cause chaos.
Nope. We had neighbors check on us, we checked on our neighbors. In the weeks since our office reopened I’ve heard many stories of neighbors helping neighbors, strangers checking on strangers. People helping others because they felt that desire inside themselves to help.
The daily lives of the adults we see, especially during the school year, are often scheduled down to the minute because they’re taking kids back and forth then going to work, then feeding their little ones and making sure they get the homework done and are wearing clean clothes to school. There’s days here at the office that feel “chaotic” because our patients are so energetic and at times there could be two dozen or so under our roof.
That darn storm threw a lot of us out of balance, upended many lives and we momentarily lost control. But it wasn’t chaotic, was it? All of us at the office have a roof over our heads, the power is back, and life has returned to some semblance of “control”, and for that we are all grateful.
If you or someone you know is looking for a dentist for their (hopefully energetic, because that’s the way we like them) little ones, give us a call or stop in and say hi while your little one climbs on the Jungle Gym and we’ll take it from there.
~ Mark
