The ‘SmiLing Teeth’

Discretionary Disclaimer:

The characters, places, events depicted in this articulate creation are purely fictional which are based on non fictional ideas & incidences. Any factual resemblance & relation, if found, to any of such characters, places, events has to be purely coincidental & also unintentional.

Also several caricatures & cartoons, animated or otherwise depicted in this article are for representational purpose & does not bear any commercial or advertisement connection; nor any attempt of creating awareness or some ‘issued in public interest’ kindda stuff.

 So off lately, again having struck off with an unusual theme & track while counting & staring on to the teeth, without any special reason or occasion or even for the sake of revolving thoughts around to write something; so chewing, biting & churning the words, around thirty two times in countless ways, so as to digest & to create yet again another articulate creation.

Moving back simply to creatively carve out the words on the teeth & fill in the cavity gaps, coating the bleeding gums, glossing & piercing throughout. When it comes to teeth; brushing rigorously, rubbing, rather scrubbing with hell lot accessories of tooth pastes ranging from anti sensitive, anti oxidant, ingredients containing fluoride, anti calculus, anti plaque, whitening specialist etc; with toothbrushes designed to be firm, soft bristled & even extra-soft bristled long & short strokes, just to wipe out anything & everything & needless to point out the flavors of toothpaste; be it crystals, salt, mint, sugar free, chocolate & many such ice cream tastes. New addition to the shelf of accessories is concentrated liquid used as mouth rinse & wash; bubbling with luke warm to keep all day long fresh. Even the chocolates & chewing gum have been designed least to erode but to brighten up the teeth & reduce the chances of tooth decay.

Visiting a small saloon at a corner side, under a tree or be it a professionally run saloon (habib chachu); most of us intentionally expect rather strongly aspire to walk out of the saloon; as if the spotlight ought to be over the head & the crowded streets seems to take a glance at the new hairstyle (be it peculiarly different or spectacularly adorable & vivacious).

This one, unusually are the fictional & non fictional experiences of couple of hours at a dentist; a place where charges are billed on the volume & pitch of screams & the number of visits in a year are directly proportional to the number of patients awaiting for check up at a given point of time. The bizarre & instinctive err feeling after entering in to dentist; is something like stucking up in a roller coaster with echoing screams & turmoils in the stomach.

The ambience is barely dreadly enough to think about accidental breaking of teeth, sprouting blood all over a small cut, forcing onto the jaws & chin to open wide like a dinosaur. Having firmly taken seat on one of the mechanized chairs; just closing the eyes & playing by the words in the back of the mind & conscience…..

Keenly observing the business, emotions, feelings, sensitivity, ethical pressures & such impersonal parameters to be associated & interlinked with ‘teeth’. The very first glimpses of the commercials to be impressive & dashing by having a ‘Colgate Smile’; or simply uttering Cheese or Paneer while taking snap & until the right mood is captured with the ‘best & perfect smiling teeth’

Welcome to ‘The world of teeth’; undoubtedly the place of undiscovered  pearls; except for the medical terminologies & experiments, which are carried out as part of Hippocratic Oath; for sake of assignments, projects, inventions & specimen tests & researches etc.

So, having come across on to the different sizes, patterns, shades; be it fainted, bright, faded or hell lot colors at different points of time; when it comes to giving a killing instinct, wide opening of the windows & doorways, shyful or even aggressive smile. Teeth, as a sole factor has its own distinctive persona; which has innumerous senses such as sensitive itching, swelling, piercing, tittering teeth in fear, anger, frustration or simply depression.

Meanwhile, exercising long & short breathes & holding onto breathes; while synchronizing with the pumping devices & gadgets, perspiring through the senses……

The classic legends of the tooth fairy; sprouted thoughts of a fairy that gives a child gifts in exchange for a baby tooth that has fallen out. Children typically place the tooth under their pillow at night. The fairy is said to take the tooth from under the pillow & replace it with gift in kind once they have fallen asleep.

Technically ‘teeth’ of humans are small, calcified, hard, whitish structures found in the mouth. They function in mechanically breaking down items of food by cutting & crushing them in preparation for swallowing & digestion. The roots of teeth are embedded in the maxilla (upper jaw) or the mandible (lower jaw) & are covered by gums. Teeth are made of multiple tissues of varying density & hardness.

Teeth are among the most distinctive (& long-lasting) features of mammal species. Humans, like other mammals, are diphyodont, meaning that they develop two sets of teeth. The first set (also called the "baby", "milk", "primary", & "deciduous" set) normally starts to appear at about six months of age, although some babies are born with one or more visible teeth, known as neonatal teeth. Normal tooth eruption at about six months is known as ‘teething’.

Deciduous teeth, otherwise known as baby teeth, are the first set of teeth in the growth development of humans & many other mammals. In some Asian countries they are referred to as ‘fall teeth’ as they will eventually fall out, while in almost all European languages they are called ‘milk teeth’.

They develop during the embryonic stage of development & erupt that is, they become visible in the mouth during infancy. They are usually lost & replaced by permanent teeth, but in the absence of permanent replacements, they can remain functional for many years.

 

Unlike most mammals, which grow baby teeth & then replace them with a single permanent set of adult teeth, elephants have cycles of tooth rotation throughout their entire lives. The tusks have milk precursors, which fall out quickly & the adult tusks are in place by one year of age, but the chewing teeth are replaced five or very rarely, six times in an elephant's lifetime.

A shark tooth is one of the numerous teeth of a shark. Sharks continually shed their teeth, & some Carcharhiniformes shed approximately 35,000 teeth in a lifetime. In some geological formations, shark's teeth are a common fossil; which can be analyzed for information on shark evolution & biology, especially because the teeth are often the only part of the shark to be fossilized, in fact fossil teeth comprise much of the fossil record of the Selachimorpha, extending back hundreds of millions of years.

The shape of sharks' teeth vary according to their diet; those species that feed on mollusks & crustaceans have dense flattened teeth for crushing, those that feed on fish have needle-like teeth for gripping, & those that feed on larger prey such as mammals have pointed lower teeth for gripping & triangular upper teeth with serrated edges for cutting. The teeth of plankton-feeders such as the basking shark are greatly reduced & non-functional.

Various cultures have conventional customs relating to the loss of deciduous teeth. These were most commonly associated with mice or other rodents on account of their sharp, everlasting teeth.

In Britain, lost teeth were commonly burnt to destroy them. This was partly for religious reasons connected with the ‘Last Judgment’ & partly for fear of what might happen if an animal got them.

A rhyme is also said as a blessing:

Old tooth, New tooth; Pray God send me a new tooth!!..

In India, as well, young children offer their discarded baby teeth to the sun, sometimes wrapped in a tiny rag of cotton turf. In southern India, children bury their teeth in the soil hoping for a newer one to grow. The Sri Lankan tradition is to throw the milk teeth onto the roof or a tree in the presence of a squirrel. The child then tells the squirrel to take the old tooth in return for a new one.

The Indian Medical Association (I.M.A.), the national organization of “Doctors of Modern Scientific System of Medicine”, was established in 1928, & currently IMA has around 1,78,000 members belonging to different branches of medical profession & functions through a network of more than 1700 local branches, located in different parts throughout India.

Tooth tradition present in the United States sometimes comes under different names. A Ratón Pérez appeared in the tale of the Vain Little Mouse. The Ratoncito Pérez was used by Colgate marketing in Venezuela & Spain. In Italy, the Tooth Fairy (Fatina) is also often replaced by a small mouse (topino). In France & in French-speaking Belgium, this character is called la petite souris ("The Little Mouse"). From parts of lowland Scotland comes a tradition similar to the fairy mouse: a white fairy rat that purchases the teeth with coins. In some places in Australia & Norway, the children put the tooth in a glass of water. In medieval Scandinavia there was a tradition, surviving to the present day in Iceland, of tannfé ('tooth-money'), a gift to a child when it cuts its first tooth.

Moving back to the technicalities, enamel is the hardest & most highly mineralized substance of the body. It is one of the four major tissues which make up the tooth, along with dentin, cementum, & dental pulp. It is normally visible & must be supported by underlying dentin. 96% of enamel consists of mineral, with water & organic material comprising the rest.

Suspecting for smoking habits, tobacco & other such deadly stuffs; is likely possible in case, yellow tarnished teeth have a peculiar bad odour. Tooth abnormalities may be categorized according to whether they have environmental or developmental causes. While environmental abnormalities may appear to have an obvious cause, there may not appear to be any known cause for some developmental abnormalities.

Environmental forces may affect teeth during development, destroy tooth structure after development, discolor teeth at any stage of development, or alter the course of tooth eruption. Developmental abnormalities most commonly affect the number, size, shape, & structure of teeth.

Tooth destruction after development from processes is considered a normal physiologic process but may become severe enough to become a pathologic condition & the study of dental trauma is called dental traumatology.

Attrition is the loss of tooth structure by mechanical forces from opposing teeth. Attrition initially affects the enamel &, if unchecked, may proceed to the underlying dentin.

Abrasion is the loss of tooth structure by mechanical forces from a foreign element. If this force begins at the cement enamel junction, then progression of tooth loss can be rapid since enamel is very thin in this region of the tooth. A common source of this type of tooth wear is excessive force when using a toothbrush.

Erosion is the loss of tooth structure due to chemical dissolution by acids not of bacterial origin. Signs of tooth destruction from erosion are a common characteristic in the mouths of people since vomiting results in exposure of the teeth to gastric acids. Another important source of erosive acids is from frequent sucking of lemon juice.

Abfraction is the loss of tooth structure from flexural forces. As teeth flex under pressure, the arrangement of teeth touching each other, known as occlusion, causes tension on one side of the tooth & compression on the other side of the tooth. This is believed to cause V-shaped depressions on the side under tension & C-shaped depressions on the side under compression. When tooth destruction occurs at the roots of teeth, the process is referred to as internal resorption, when caused by cells within the pulp, or external resorption, when caused by cells in the periodontal ligament.

Discoloration of teeth may result from bacteria stains, tobacco, tea, coffee, foods with an abundance of chlorophyll, restorative materials, & medications. Stains from bacteria may cause colors varying from green to black to orange. Green stains also result from foods with chlorophyll or excessive exposure to copper or nickel. Amalgam, a common dental restorative material, may turn adjacent areas of teeth black or gray. Long term use of chlorhexidine, a mouthwash may encourage extrinsic stain formation near the gingiva on teeth.

Systemic disorders also can cause tooth discoloration. Some medications, such as tetracycline antibiotics, may become incorporated into the structure of a tooth, causing intrinsic staining of the teeth.

Lastly in the bottom line, the broken teeth is very exhausted & seems to be dwindling after having digested more than couple of thousand words in a go. So, having brightened, exercised the ‘teeth’; over petty stuffs; be it the human baby teeth, tusks of giant elephant; shark tooth, etc. The very next time, you watch out into the mirror, you ought to stare at your very own ‘smiling teeth’ with an appealing & impressive smile!!....

~Thank You~