mastication

So, I had four teeth pulled out of my head today. Apparently, I've been trying to cram 32 teeth into a 28-tooth mouth. Next time someone tells me I have a big mouth, I'm coming after them with pliers. We pulled them because I'm getting braces--time to straighten them all out. It will be strange having straight teeth. I'm looking forward to it.

The ones we yanked are the first premolars, also called the bicuspids. They are the double-pointed teeth right behind your cuspids--your canines. Today, I've learned what they are for--eating. Your wedge-like incisors, front and center, are for tearing vegetable matter, your big, flat molars at the back are for crushing nuts and seeds, and your cuspids are for battling rivals in your territory. But once the vegetables have been torn, the seeds crushed, and the rivals vanquished, basic chewing seems to fall to the first and second bicuspids. I discovered this today by trying to chew a piece of soft cheese--something that needs neither tearing, crushing, nor vanquishing. I couldn't do it. it just rattled around in the space where my teeth used to be. It's a weird feeling and has reduced me to eating only foods that I can masticate between my tongue and the roof of my mouth. I assume that a solution will present itself before I wither away.