Other Peoples Pain
Paul Hostovsky
My dentist told me when I was ten
that some people dont even need Novocain
different thresholds for different
ten-year-olds. This was in Irvington
New Jersey in 1968, right after
I thrashed and bucked in his chair
which reared up on its hind legs
when the Novocain didnt work, and the pain
for which there were no words in the whole
world wouldnt fit inside my head.
And I started to cry.
I still cant get my head around
other peoples pain being any
different from mine. And I have yet to meet
someone who can fit the pain of the world
into the tiny cavity of a deciduous tooth
without a little Novocain. That being said,
its hard to imagine the pain of all the people
in pain all over the world. I can only
really imagine the pain of one person
because I am only one personand even that
is made complicated by what a dentist said
about thresholds when I was ten. I suspect
Im a wimp. I suspect another person
a better person or a stronger person or just
a person with a higher threshold for pain
wouldnt crumple under the pain that is my pain
if it were theirs. But if it were theirs,
and if they were one of the tribe that needs
Novocain, and if the Novocain didnt work,
I could imagine that. I could have compassion.
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