Tooth Ache

My Mama, was the strongest human I have ever seen. We lived twenty
miles from town and the dentist office where she was having her teeth
pulled for the dentures that she desperately needed. Six was the limit
they took out at one time. She tried to talk them into pulling all of
them at once but they wouldn't do it.&;quot;I don't know why you
won't just pull them all and get it over with six, or sixty what's the
difference&;quot; she said.

She had occasional
migraine head aches, and was suffering really bad late one afternoon
with her sick headache as she called it. Light would really bother her
so she would lay in a dark room with no noise. I took a large bucket
and sat it beside the bed, she always threw up with these headaches. I
never thought anybody could throw up that much, with nothing in their
stomach but she did. I would keep cold wash clothes on her forehead
empty her bucket and keep it washed out.

&;quot;
How you feeling mama&;quot; I said. &;quot;I don't know if its my
teeth hurting now or my head or both but it hurts really bad&;quot;
she said.  Mama, never complained so when she said she was hurting
really bad I got worried and watched her even closer. After we went to
bed that night something woke me I guessed it was Mama stumbling in the
dark,I got up just in time to see her going out the back door and into
the tractor shed.

I heard her moaning and ran out to
see if she was okay, and saw her standing there in the moonlight with a
pair of Dads wire pliers holding a tooth that she had just jerked out
of her mouth. My God, Mama, how did you do that are you okay.
&;quot;I couldn't stand it any longer&;quot; she said. I helped
her up the steps and into the house. &;quot;Was it the tooth hurting
you?&;quot;  &;quot;I don't know, he should have pulled them
out they're all loose anyway, right now I'm about to pass
out&;quot; I got her a washcloth and helped her get back in bed. I
emptied her bucket and went back to bed myself.

In
the morning she was up cooking breakfast, at 5:30 as if nothing had
ever happened. She said she was hurting so bad she didn't remember much
about last night except that she had to stop the pain, and if she
couldn't have found the pliers she might have have used the hammer and
I don't doubt that she would have.