It seems very strange to me that so many parents are so totally unsuited for the children they have, and vice versa. If my parents and I had met on a date to see if we were compatible, we would have nodded politely, smiled, and cut the evening short with a feigned excuse or two.

It's not that my parents were bad. In many ways they were very good parents. My father worked hard so that my mother could stay home with my sister and me for the first ten or eleven years of my life. My mother was a terrific homemaker. There were homemade Halloween costumes, nutritious dinners, daily story times, and adventures at the park. I was never abused or neglected.

And yet, I don't think I got what I really needed from them. I don't think they even realized I needed anything beyond what they provided, which, granted, was beyond what many parents provide their children.

I was a sensitive child, and I got the impression (erroneous or not) very early on that I couldn't quite trust them. When my sister needed glasses, they told me sternly to protect my eyesight so I wouldn't end up like my sister. I needed glasses soon after, but rather than telling them, I hid my worsening myopia from them for the next three years, by the end of which I was pretty damn blind. They didn't seem to notice. I didn't ask for much from them; they might have given it if I had, but I always felt too guilty to ask. Even a ride to a friend's house was made out to be a favor granted at considerable inconvenience to them.

In high school, my parents were busy with their own pursuits and seemed to think that as long as I was a good kid and got fantastic grades, I was doing fine. And to some extent, I was. I had my cat, who has probably always been closer to me than my parents have. I had my friend Tracey's family, who taught me how to drive, gave me rides everywhere, fed me, and all but adopted me. More recently, when I got my first flat tire on my way to a tutoring appointment and was stranded by myself on the side of a freeway with a dying cell phone, my parents were oblivious to my panicky phone call. It was my student's father who came to wait with me for the hour it took the tow truck to show up. And of course, there was that whole heartbreaking month in which Naomi died, the worst time of my life up to this point. Not much from them then, either, although they were there for all of it. Being stubborn, proud, and standoffish, I never asked for help. And they never thought to offer. That's our relationship in a nutshell.

Before meeting Kevin, I never realized I had any emotional baggage. I didn't have any prior relationships; my relationship with the cat was uncomplicated but totally functional; I knew I wouldn't have to worry about codependency or biological clocks. I have since discovered that I have major trust issues and find it hard to believe that even a husband would go very far out of his way for me, even though past precedent should have persuaded me otherwise by now.

Inevitably, I'd make a pretty poor parent, impatient, unaffectionate, and far more interested in cats than toddlers. I'm not sure it would even be a matter of poor fit; I think I'd be bad for any child. (Although I think I'd make a great eccentric aunt to visit from time to time.) I don't want to mess anyone up for life. Just call me Ms. Biological Dead-End. I'll take it as a compliment.

"So, how high is your pain tolerance?" my dentist greeted me today as I sat down to get a small cavity filled. Not words you ever want to hear from your dentist. In fact, how well I tolerate pain is entirely dependent on the company in which I am expected to tolerate it. Amongst people I don't know well and would like to preserve my demeanor of polite indifference with, it is quite high.

And that was how I ended up getting a cavity filled with no anaesthesia. I kind of get the principle behind machismo now.

(I should say: it wasn't that bad. There were a few moments in which my fingers clenched themselves hard, but overall, the moments of pain were more interesting than anything else. Pain at the dentist's is a chilly, icy pain that goes straight from my brain to my toes. It struck me as blue pain, as opposed to the red pain of a stomach ache or a burn. I don't think I have synesthesia, though.)

Making dentist appointments is one of those things that I hate most about being an adult. As a kid, my mom made the appointments, and much as I kicked and screamed about them, I had to go. Now I'm expected to voluntarily schedule and keep my own appointments with someone of whom I am absolutely terrified. My dentist is quite a small and unintimidating woman, but I walk in there and my hands shake. Granted, given a choice between going to a necessary dental checkup and a loud party with people I didn't know or want to know, I'd probably pick the dentist. But that's more an expression of my misanthropy than anything else.

To make things worse, the woman who cleans my teeth is very, very, very thorough. A half hour checkup easily becomes a fifty minute session of lying face up with my eyes closed and my knees trembling as various instruments are poked into my gums. To calm myself down, I count ceiling tiles, watch floaters, try to remember to breathe, and make mental lists of reasons why being at the dentist is so unpleasant. Here's what I came up with last time. Feel free to add your own!

• Reason #1: the drills, vacuums, and polishing devices used are very small and therefore emit very high-pitched noises. When they are all going at the same time, the cumulative effect is not unlike being in a classroom with ten chalkboards and ten sets of fingernails.
• Reason #2: humans feel instinctively uncomfortable and vulnerable at having odd objects wielded by relative strangers poked into their orifices. Also see: gynecologist.
• Reason #3: it's cold in the office. And there are bright white lights. I imagine an alien abduction would be a similar experience (see #1 and #2).
• Reason #4: the smell of peppermint, mouthwash, plastic, and machinery and its association with fear was ingrained at an early age. If someone made that into a perfume, it would be an awesome people-repellent.
• Reason #5: it's expensive. There's a Chinese saying (phonetically something like 'hua chien sho zhrai) about spending money to buy pain that comes to mind every single time I pull out my debit card at the end of an appointment. Do you have any idea how many books I could have bought with that money?

All of which is to say that humans should evolve into beings who get a new set of teeth every decade or so. I'd happily put off the dentist for awhile if I knew that there was a whole new set of teeth waiting for me in a couple of years. Who's with me?