You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.

I’m 26 years old and despite still being considered young, in a lot of ways I’m still old enough to know better. I often find myself saying things like I should know this by now or this should come easy, but something I’m coming to realize the more I open my eyes is that everyone in on their own timeline and no one can escape their own timeline.

Sometimes our ships need to sink and sometimes we need to suffer; sometimes the things that makes us happy also need to make us sad; things we thought we wanted somehow turns into things we don’t and things we never thought would make us happy somehow become the very things that do.

One of the beautiful things about that realization is the understanding that there are countless worlds walking among us every single day and yet we hardly notice because the only world we’re usually caught up in is —

ourselves.

But we were never meant to be one-dimensional; we were meant to collide, to intercept.

So much is happening in every given moment that we can’t even comprehend; the presence of growth is so present all the time, it’s actually overwhelming to think about.

Right now, someone is jumping out of a plane or off a cliff into a deep sea of water for the sake of feeling free, as a means of surrender, or as a means to let go; someone is ordering food on their own for the first time despite their internal fear that the waiter is secretly judging them; someone is applying for that one job they don’t think they’re qualified for; someone is moving across the country or even out of the country; someone’s leaving of a bad relationship meanwhile someone else is committing to a good one. There are so many moments happening right now that are going to change the course of several lifetimes.

And on my timeline, at this moment in my life, something so important that has managed to escape my grasp and remain under the radar for decades entirely has finally revealed itself to me in a way I can no longer unconsciously ignore.

And what is that, you may ask? Dental Hygiene.

Something so simple and so obvious that I find myself thinking I should know this by now or this should come easy, but it doesn’t. I feel like a kid again, but this time with a conscious full of shame.

Maybe its because society has built up the youth like we’re the strongest demographic of the crop; how we’re undefeated by opponents like heart disease, arthritis, hearing aids, or dentures. And although we may be susceptible to cases of depression or anxiety, under “no circumstance” may we suffer from something negatively impacting our auto-immunity. Depression can be socially dismissed to the extent that after a while, we’ll just stop talking about it and suffer in silence, but chronic fatigue? Brain fog? Joint pain? Don’t be dramatic. Drink more water, exercise! Stop being lazy, you’re fine.

Society is strategic that way. Somewhere along the lines, we’ve gotten good at gaslighting each other into believing we’re okay. Our most prized possession in our collection of toxic behaviors is the concept of fine. I mean, how unbelievably obnoxious it is that a single word can resemble both night and day meanings. How it can have such a widely-viewed surface-level identity that is perceived as optimistic while sheltering such an undertone so dark and full of despair that it makes no sense how easily missed it can be. Like there’s a 50/50 chance someone chooses to believe you when you say you’re fine when you’re really not and how absolutely devastating that is.

But society is strategic that way.

We’re vulnerable to braces, not wooden cases*, which is why we tremble at the thought of cutting one down-to-size.

But death doesn’t discriminate
…
between the sinners and the saints
it takes and it takes and it takes
And we keep living anyway
We rise and we fall
And we break
And we make our mistakes

Sorry, had to take a short Hamilton intermission for the sake of lightening up the tone.

But the truth is, no one can tell you that death plays favorites, human mortality is impartial, its ruthless, and we would be wise not to take our health for granted.

I won’t anymore.

Up until now, hygiene has merely been a concept talked about but never one I truly understood.

When I was young, I hated to shower. And I thought that if I skipped a step, it would make the process go by quicker, so I did; I cut out shampoo — the first step, guys. Shampoo. I had tried cutting out conditioner but shampoo just gave me tangles and conditioner made it smooth. Since I didn’t know they were different, I thought soap is soap and cut out the shampoo. I never used body wash, never scrubbed my feet, never washed my face, I mean, personal hygiene just didn’t click for me, I was disgusting.

And when I’d get bullied for my greasy hair, my body odor or the acne on my skin, it never occurred to me that these things could take a different turn; that they were a product of my own self-neglect and that my hair didn’t have to look greasy, that my body’s natural scent had the potential not to be repulsive. I wasn’t mature enough to question why my body was developing so poorly despite me showering. It never occurred to me it was the shampoo that cleaned the dirt off my hair, the body soap that washed away the nasty scent, it didn’t click for me.

I was too focused on time and not on actually taking care of myself.

I mean, I brushed my teeth every day. Somedays twice. I thought I was empowering myself by choosing to deny society the extra money I’d spend on something as “cosmetic” as mouthwash and chose to be content walking around exhaling the flavor of my toothpaste. It was simple to me; I thought, who doesn’t like the smell of bubble gum? Why do I need to rinse it out with spearmint? No thanks, I’m good. And that was my life.

I didn’t know that the mouthwash was meant to wash away old food particles. I thought that the harder I brushed, the better it meant I was taking care of my teeth. And that was it, I thought that was enough. Little did I know I was doing more damage than good because one day, I started bleeding.

I knew nothing about tooth decay, root canals, receding gums, or tartar. I knew there was a name for when the gums bleed, but I wasn’t mature enough to understand that it didn’t have to keep happening. I just thought it was normal. It’s been over seven years.

And I find myself angry that nobody warned me, though I’m mature enough to acknowledge that the reality is that they probably did, I just wasn’t listening. They probably tried, I just didn’t care. And now I grieve all the passion that was wasted on me by hygiene advocates and doctors trying to teach me how to care for myself when the whole time I was just an empty vessel with no soul. My spirit wasn’t awakened yet. I wasn’t conscious, asleep at the wheel, on auto-pilot.

I’ve lost track of several years of my life and priceless memories I’ll never get back simply because I wasn’t present for any of them. I can only hope for the chance to live vicariously through the memories of others who lived life with me during the years when I wasn’t “there.” And now that I’ve come to realize just how valuable life really is, I grieve all that wasted breath, all their wasted time.

So as I get older, these things start to become my new version of nightmares. Not some monster under the bed or the shadow leaking out of the dark ever-so-slightly cracked open closet. No, tooth decay, diabetes, heart disease, cancer.

I’m 26 years old and up until this point in my life, I had never flossed before. And the craziest thing is I wouldn’t even consider flossing a delicate topic; it’s nothing to be taboo about but at the same time, it’s also very rarely a subject that gets brought up among friends.

Perhaps its relative to sex in the sense that everyone just assumes we all get this “sit down” talk about how to brush our safely, how to floss, and how mouthwash is not just for fresh smelling breath but to flush out all the junk the floss left behind.

But I didn’t, did you?
So maybe we ought to talk about it more.

And just like that, I’ve become a hygiene advocate.

I’m serious, maybe we should care a little more about what it means to brush the best way or shower the best way; how to care for the skin, or how to maintain our nails.

Within two weeks of flossing and managing my teeth the way I was instructed to, I’ve stopped bleeding.

Flossing for me has become one of the moments that has changed the course of my life. I’ve literally become so grateful that I’m actually in love with the life I’ve been given. I’m happy, and I never thought I’d say that. When I was younger, you could not have convinced me that the life I live now would make me the happiest compared to any other life I’ve lived up until now.

I found happiness in the last place I’d ever thought I’d look because the last place I would ever look (meaning the last place I could ever imagine my life being so beautiful) would be earning my livelihood at a grocery store, living in the desert, in a home with my mother in law, on the east part of town.

I know.

But they say it doesn’t matter where you go, if you don’t solve your problems exactly where you’re at, all you’ll do is take them with you, so that’s what I’m doing; I’m solving my problems exactly where I’m at so that when I get to the place I’ve always wanted to be, I’m not distracted by my problems to the extent that I can’t enjoy the view.

I may not love the view just yet, but I’m way happier now that I have less problems, not to mention better teeth.

What about you? Have you had “the talk” yet about dental hygiene?

What does your routine look like?

Think about it.

Cheers,
B.

*coffins.