Monday, May 30, 2011

Small Talk with the Inmates

As part of my orientation to the prison system, they told me to not develop relationships with the inmates, not ask them personal questions and not divulge any personal information about myself to them.  So completely opposite of my appointments at the dental school, there is little to no conversing that takes place.  And when it does, it's awkward small talk at best - from last week:


Inmate: This is better than Obama-care, I've been getting free dental care for 16 years
Me: Well that's one way to look at the positive side
Inmate: Yeah, tell your friends to stay away from marijuana, that mess landed me 30 years in here...actually, I could go for a joint right now

Needless to say, the past three weeks have been very interesting.  I've done a bunch of fillings, some extractions, dentures for an 80 year old murderer who held a police officer hostage in 1951, finished up some partials for a pedophile, a root canal on a drug dealer who caught a baseball with his mandibular incisors, and an admissions exam on a 78 year old MD who was just arrested for insurance fraud.  

4 more days in the big house, and I'm not planning on ever going back!
Melissa

2 comments:

  1. On the bright side, now you get to begin dinner stories with, "Well that one time I was in prison..."

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  2. I could have gona another 24 years without knowing that my taxes were paying for murderers to get free dental care! BOO!

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