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Solenoid
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round littlemirrors, baroque
hooks, needles, drill heads,
top-like
grinders…
The
substances that give dental
offices their specific smell
were missing: the amalgam,
the gips, the anaesthetics.
There
was
no
smell
whatsoever in my tower.
Was it possible that uncle
Mikola had tried to play the
dentist at atimeof poverty in
his intricate life?Hadheused
the home chair for learning
the dental techniques?
But who could have played
the guinea pig? Or was he
trying, as an inventor, to
upgrade existing chairs,
to improve their electrical
side, the transmissions, the
rheostats? But there was no
sign of repair, no lubricant,
noloosescrews, themachine
was perfect like an insect
with hard shell and flawless
mechanical
articulations.
It was entirely functional,
although old fashioned and
somewhat weird looking as
a consequence: each turn
of a switch lit a little light
and the heads of some
suspended machine with
hard cables of metal coil
started sizzling speedily.
A switch was lifting and
lowering the chair making
the noise of an ancient
elevator. Another one made
a reddish rubber hose with a
metal piece at the end start
sucking imaginary saliva.
For a long time I was a
guest in my own house.
Because the times were
awful and one could only
find jars with floating livid
vegetables, inedible, in food
stores and because I was
suffering of loneliness like
a dog, I preferred to go on