Front Porch: Authentic beauty comes in accepting your two missing teeth, lisp, scarred knees

Whenever I get together with a friend for lunch, conversation almost always begins with what one of them calls “an organ recital,” the sharing of updates about our surgeries, aches and pains, new diagnoses, ailments of friends, hospice reports, death, debilities and all the other not-so-good stuff our demographic is subject to.

It can get so long and involved sometimes that we often wind up laughing about it all (to the degree possible) or resorting to short-cuts (“Fred’s thing, still stage 1”).

Nothing could be more boring to an outsider, so, rest comfortably, this won’t be an organ recital, but rather, a bit of bemusement at where such things can lead.

Starting with a smile. Thesis statement: The only place a toothless smile is attractive, whimsical even, is on the face of a 5-year-old awaiting a visit from the tooth fairy. For any of the rest of us, not so much.

And here I am, with two teeth removed (at the front of my mouth, naturally), with no relief expected from the tooth fairy. A three-tooth bridge repair deteriorated into something else, a temporary cover-up failed, oral surgery occurred a week later, and I am, as of this writing, still waiting for a two-tooth temporary flipper thingy to use for cosmetic purposes (coming any day now, I hope) until the new embedded post heals and a new bridge can be placed – probably at the end of the year.

Ah, oral surgery. I’ve always joked about it, using it as a metaphor up against which I evaluated other distasteful experiences. When my youngest son was getting married six years ago, many in the wedding party were going off together for a spa day, to which I was invited. The highlight, I was told, would be pedi- and manicures.

Ah, pedicure. That would mean having to have someone touch my toes. Be forewarned – touch my toes in any fashion and I will have to kill you. That’s the only choice. I told my son that I’d rather have oral surgery. Without anesthesia. With a dull scalpel and rusty drill bit. But he knew that already, and we found a way for me to graciously decline.

So now – not being an adorable 5-year-old – when I appear in public, I wear my COVID mask. I look like either a concerned citizen or a germophobe, depending on who is judging, and, I must say, it’s damn hot under that thing.

One friend suggested I could just stick a cigarette in the hole as camouflage, but with the size of the gap, it would take a Havana cigar to fill the space. Plus, I don’t smoke, and it’s too late to add that particular bad habit to my repertoire.

My lip keeps getting sucked into the hole, which causes me to lisp a little when I speak, so on top of the muffled sounds from behind the mask, what now issues forth is something like “thister, thith is a big meth to deal with in the thummertime.”

I’m told the awaited flipper device will exacerbate the lisping until I get used to it. Oh joy.

And, of course, all the while, the dueling banjos tune from the film “Deliverance” keeps looping in my head.

And then there are knees, which are making their seasonal public reappearance, thanks to the heat of summer. They are now on view at the lake, courtesy of people splashing about in bathing suits – but among my peers, they are more on display at the grocery store, due to the wearing of Bermuda shorts, and, in my case, pedal pushers, which just cover the top of the knee.

Emerging from below wherever the leg garments stop, I am now seeing the bottom half of the telltale scars of knee-replacement surgeries among us 70-, 80- and 90-year-olds. I have a set of my own that I’m now flashing around as I’m out there among ’em, and I’ve been making a point of looking for them on legs wherever I go.

I’m not sure if it’s a misery-loves-company thing (an unspoken organ recital sharing moment) or I’m just in need of a more socially acceptable (or less creepy) hobby.

I’m a little surprised at how many of these scars I’m seeing, especially when I’m at a medical building, but the count continues. Good for us that we’re still out there, still vertical and moving about on our titanium-improved legs.

And if you should happen to see a tallish, gray-haired, masked old lady, not saying much out loud (but lisping when she does), wandering the aisles of Rosauers, assessing the legs of male and female passers-by – but not making eye contact – you needn’t call security.

It’s probably just me, and I’m pretty harmless. Just don’t touch my toes … then you’re in for real trouble, mithter.

Voices correspondent Stefanie Pettit can be reached by email at upwindsailor@comcast.net