Many writers have shared their thoughts with the public:

"There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they'll take you." - Beatrix Potter

"The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say." - Ana s Nin

"Sharing your writing, being enlarged by others' writing, is what makes you feel famous." - Gretchen Bernabei

"Writing is not an amusing occupation. It is a combination of ditch-digging, mountain-climbing, treadmill and childbirth." - Edna Ferber

"Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing." - Ben Franklin

"One must be drenched in words, literally soaked in them, to have the right ones to form themselves into the proper pattern at the right moment." - Hart Crane

"There are three rules for writing. Unfortunately, no one can agree what they are." - W. Somerset Maugham

The Sprout of Doubt

'c' 'c' 'c'

as in

Ja ccc kie

as in

Jaccckie Kliminal - Oral Maintenance & Hygiene Specialist

"You are a dentist, right?" I half joke.

"A mechanic for the mouth," she shoots back, dead as a pan.

Reclining in a padded chair, feet off the ground, mouth open, head back, I ponder: Were the three 'c's' the result of being the spawn of a polyamorous troika comprised of a Colin-Christina-Camilla or a Caroline-Charlotte-Caleb... or maybe-

"It's all looking randy dandy in there, Seb. Just a few more minutes and we'll be done."

Five years on and Jaccckie is still my dentist, but a sprout of doubt hovers like a luminant moth in the night, and that's because whether I see her once a year, twice a year, or once every three years, outside of a polish, clean and some detailed flossing and brushing instructions, everything is always 'perfect'.

I've never had any x-rays, extractions, implants, fillings, bridges, bondings, veneers or crowns; I've never sighted another patient, either leaving when I'm on my way in, or sitting in the waiting room on my way out; nor have I ever encountered a receptionist or an assistant holding that little saliva-sucking hose. It's just her. Doing everything. And it's always... looking randy dandy in there, Seb. Just a few more minutes and we'll be done.

"You know, I've still got all four wisdom teeth," I announce on a visit, after she declares another clean bill of oral health.

"Yes, I know. I can see them."

Can you, Jaccckie? Can you really 'c' 'c' 'c' them? Can you identify them? Do you know their technical names or are they all just 'teethy things' to you?

"Wouldn't it be better to have them out?" I ask.

"Are they causing you any pain or discomfort? Catching on food?"

"Well, no, not really."

"How about for now we just keep an eye on them. I'll make sure we get right in there with the fluoride on the next clean and polish. And I'll show you how to floss in those harder to reach areas."

At my next annual check-up, I ask Jaccckie about my fillings - the three I had done when I was a kid by a butcher called Doctor Joseph, and whom I always suspected was having an affair with my mother. In Doctor Joseph's waiting room, you heard everything; especially the poor kid who was in the chair ahead of you.

"Stop bellowing like a moose!" he would boom in his angry baritone to some poor, quivering child. My mother, eyes on a magazine, would casually remark, "Poor Doctor Joseph. What that handsome, virile, well intentioned kind soul has to put up with just to make a living."

"He hurts people," I would plead in defence of the poor girl we could hear sobbing. In response my mother would raise her head from the magazine, gaze into the distance, bite her bottom lip and affect what could only be described as a lascivious smile.

"Why are you concerned about your fillings," Jaccckie asks, poking and pressing with her gloved hand. "Mmm... yes... they are quite old. A good dose of mercury in those I bet... nothing outside of a seismic 10 magnitude earthquake is going to move those three onions. Whoever did them definitely knew their sage from their parsley."

Geological citations, condiment metaphors, and the reference to 'teeth' as 'onions' aside, I can barely contain my exasperation. "I've heard stories of people slowly being poisoned by mercury leeching out of their fillings," I assert.

She laughs, "It's a very low chance, Seb, and I don't believe in replacing old fillings for the sake of it and risk stirring up unnecessary trauma."

I slide out of the chair, pay my fee, lock in the date for my next check-up, and skulk out.

A month later, I chip a molar on a prune pit, hiding in what was supposed to be a pitted prune. Better still, it's one of my mercury filled teeth. I can barely contain my excitement. Surely, this will bring things to a head. You can't just clean and polish a chipped tooth filled with dangerous, 'on the loose' mercury, and wrap up the session with instructions on how to floss and brush. I immediately call Jaccckie to make an appointment. Two hours later, I'm in the chair.

"What's the problem, Seb, I only saw you a month ago."

"Chipped a tooth on a prune pip. Bottom molar. One of the ones with an old mercury filling in it," I declare, a little too triumphantly.

"Do you know you can buy pitted prunes these days?"

"Yes, I do, and they were pitted, but I guess somebody at the prune plant took their eye off the ball."

She asks me to open my mouth.

"Ah... yes, I see it. It's a clean sliver... right out of the side. Very neat. Tell me if this hurts at all," she says, tapping away.

I tell her that it doesn't, though I'm tempted to say otherwise.

"You know what," she announces, "I'm going to file around the edges, and we should be good to go."

I nearly bite her finger. Is she kidding? A piece of tooth has come out of the side of my molar that has a filling in it and she's going to file around the edges and 'we're good to go?'

"Really? Nothing else?"

"You were lucky, Seb. It's a shallow break, and as there's no pain, it should be fine if you brush and floss like I've shown you. I've just uploaded an instructional YouTube video. I'll send you the link."

She beams at me with nothing but good will. I begin to feel a little guilty and start to question my suspicions. Maybe I've got it all wrong. Maybe she was once a brilliant dental surgeon and a traumatic incident caused her to lose her nerve and trust herself with nothing but cleaning, polishing, filing, and uploading instructional videos on YouTube on how to floss.

As I'm sorting out the bill, I spy a bundled heap of brightly coloured clothing in the corner: hippie clothing - kaftans, Indian shirts, head scarves.

"I've got a little clothing stall at Kirribilli markets," she explains. "I do it once a month for a bit of fun."

"Cool," I say. "A friend of mine is a molecular physicist, covers herself in gold paint and pretends to be a statue at Circular Quay on weekends. Makes a killing."

As Jaccckie predicted, I had no further problems with my chipped molar, but a year later, and a couple of weeks before I'm due to see her for my annual check-up, I click on a piece from my local newsfeed. It's about a dentist facing charges for operating a practice without any formal qualifications. And there's a photo of Jaccckie.

Instead of vindication, I feel bad. After all, She never did me any harm, though I had to wonder about the of state of my teeth considering I hadn't technically seen a dentist in nearly ten years.

I call her.

Disconnected.

But get this. On the day before my pre-scheduled annual appointment, she calls.

"Hi Seb, it's Jaccckie. Just a reminder about your two pm appointment for tomorrow afternoon and to let you know I'm operating a home service now."

"Like house calls?"

"No, nothing like that," she says, quickly, defensively. "I'm working out of my apartment. It's properly fitted out and allows me to provide greater flexibility to all my patients... a more personal service. In fact, you won't even feel like you're at the dentist."