Aunt Clara vs. Trojan Bacteria
So my world-famous Aunt Clara celebrated B-day #100 back on the Fourth of July and I have a serious case of DNA envy.
And being the nephew and all puts me in pretty good chromosomal shape but there are no guarantees. My dad was a great athlete but these days the best I can do is lay claim to being a total blur, even for a gracefully maturing white guy, as long as I’m on a stationary bike in a roomful of mirrors.
Aunt Clara, born while Archduke Franz Ferdinand still had a thready pulse, has survived the LA chapter of the Black Hand (even if Uncle Jack didn’t…but he still took down two gangsters in the gun fight), the Black Sox scandal, the Great Depression, BOTH World Wars, a few local riots, Will Ferrell, and even the George Dubya Bush administration. Yeah, the Birthday girl has definitely seen ‘em come and go.
Aunt C. was my mom’s closest sister in a mega-sized Sicilian family and one reason she’s still around trying to figure out why Kobe still needs $24 million/year is she was the only sibling who wasn’t diabetic. But there’s more; guess who my leadoff prime-time patient was when I was a first-year USC dental student? Yeah, mental toughness definitely helps you get to ten decades. My Aunt survived me AND didn’t even have any issues with the mystery burritos off the truck in the D-school parking lot.
And how many eighty-something year-olds do you know who were recruited like a Five-Star tailback outa Long Beach Poly for a production manager spot in the garment industry? Oh, almost forgot, being a hundred doesn’t mean you can’t do your nephew’s laundry (Hey! You can’t tell me it’s not part of a proven effective fitness program.)
Anyhow, this past week Aunt Clara got a little lackadaisical and slightly wobbly. Just before I called the red truck guys in uniform who always get the girl, there was also some slurred speech, chattering teeth, and a 103 temp going on.
The diagnosis was a bacterial infection, probably E. coli. And the medical heads can say what they want but when you’ve completed a century and still feel obligated to watch a crummy USC football performance like the one against the bruins, even Bo Jackson’s immune system (in its prime) would take a hit.
Today, when I walked into the hospital room, a nurse had a grip on dozing Aunt C’s upper central incisors; I was curious. I asked if I could help. The nurse was frustrated because my aunt’s dentures wouldn’t come out.
“They’re real; all 32 of ‘em. I’m the nephew; I’m a dentist.”
And I’ve always smiled at the prospect of picking up nurses…but not off the floor.
So that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it. I don’t need to read the Surgeon General’s Report on Oral Health from May of 2000 to see the connection between oral and general health and quality of life. All I need to do is review Aunt Clara’s chart and take a look at that smile.
Healthy mouth, healthy body; healthy life: believe it. As my favorite all-time literary character, Michael Connelly’s Detective Harry Bosch always says, “I don’t believe in coincidences.”