A wonderful picture came into my mind this morning. I’m going to share it in the hope that you will enjoy it as much as I did. It will take a little setting up.
I am listening to Jennifer Paxton’s lectures on medieval England, thanks to some CD I bought when the Teaching Company was still selling CDs. She was talking about that time in the history of England when the Viking raids had been so common and so successful that fairly large numbers of them just stayed in England all year instead of going “home” and then coming back to raid again. [1]
It was the men who were doing the viking, of course and when they began to farm, it was the men who did the farming. But when it appeared that they were going to stay, they send word home to bring to them the things that they would need.
I am going to pause at that point to tell you about an experiment I conducted at Starbucks ten minutes after I heard Professor Paxton. I asked each barista what the word “retainer” meant to them. One of them is currently involved with a court proceeding of some kind, and he said his mind went to an attorney, who was on retainer. One mentioned a wall that was put up to hold back the soil of a hillside. I get that one, but I have never heard it used that way. The rest of them said it reminded them of something you put in your mouth at night of keep you from grinding all the enamel off your teeth.
I have recently begun using what my dentist calls a “Nightguard,” I suppose because it is easier to get men to use them if you call them that. But I am a tooth grinder myself and I have recently been fitted for a Nightguard.
What Professor Paxton actually said in her lecture is that the men who had been viking and who were now farming, sent home for their wives, their children, and their retainers.
Is that a great picture or what? Who knew that those fierce Vikings were so careful about their teeth?
[1] I learned from Professor Paxton that “vike” is a verb. The people that the British called “the Northmen” came to do a variety of things. When they were farming, they were farmers. When they were viking, they were Viking. Apparently, “to vike’ means to raid for plunder and slaves. These people were only Vikings while they were viking.
The Dilettante's Dilemma 
This is a subject you can really sink your teeth into!
Just couldn’t resist that one, could you? Ha!
As a parent who has paid for two sets of braces, I can claim some expertise in what a dental retainer is (and isn’t). A retainer is what you wear after your braces come off to “retain” the correct placement of your newly aligned teeth.
A mouth guard is what we grinders wear at night in order to continue to have teeth left after all that grinding! Just thought I’d toss this clarification in on a topic I know all too well.
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