The record will show that at exactly 4:32 p.m. on June 22 I reached into my mail box at the neighborhood delivery station. Mixed in with the daily harvest of fund raising appeals I found a bill from my dentist.

I looked at the envelope postmark with silent amazement. It read 06/21/11. Reviewing my movements of the previous 24 hours, I traced myself to the dentist’s office shortly before noon of that very day, 06/21/11. There I had been booked for one of the twice-annual tooth-polishing rehabilitations that my dentist thoughtfully schedules, mostly to learn if there is a clear and present danger of my teeth falling out.

Working backwords at the mail box, I calculated that no more than two or three hours could have elapsed between the time when (a) I left the dental clinic, clutching my usual complimentary packet of floss and my fruit-flavored mini-tube of tooth paste, and (b) the delivery of the bill at the nearest post office for next-day arrival at my mail box.

I marveled at the speed of this billing transaction. It was more than routine speed. It was record-breaking, Olympic-level, all-world speed. It was a level of speed that deserved asterisks and bold face in the record books, the ultimate in next- day service. You could almost build a company motto around it: “Our customers Always Leave Here With Glistening Teeth and Balanced Check Books.”

I should tell you that my dentist is well respected by his peers and is a friend of mine, stretching back to years when we routinely rode 100 miles a day on bicycles and both climbed the mountain Kilimanjaro, events which we rehash mercilessly. That takes up most of the time of my dentist’s evaluation after the technician has performed her small miracles and slipped peppermint toothpaste into my goody bag. None of this social networking time, I’m quick to tell you, finds its way into the bill. This is an honorable man who runs his dental shop amiably and badgers me only five minutes each visit to remove a disappearing rear wisdom tooth that he now claims he can find only with sonar equipment.

What worries me about that speed-of-light billing is that somebody in the administrative office may have taken a look at the latest actuarial tables, factored in my age, and decided that a good time to bill this guy is sooner than later.

This would sadden me. Yes, I have lost a step and the attendance at my annual high school reunion is approaching single digits. But I have just finished riding herd on 130 Type A personalities on a seven-day bike ride to Minnesota towns like Blackduck, Bigfork and Deer River with interim stops at outposts like The Hoot and Holler Rendezvous and the Gosh Dam café. Still I emerged in reasonably sound mental health and with my love for humanity intact.

But I have to think seriously about the implications of that hot-breathed billing in my mailbox. The average age in America is rising; it does tend to build a new realism among the golden agers. I know completely healthy older folks who routinely pass up big markdowns for jumbo packages of wiring and 65 watt flood lamps in the big box hardware stores and supermarkets. They tell me it’s all about using hard bark Yankee logic, because where they’re going in a few years they may have no use for wires and light bulbs, even at 40 per cent off. I’m not that smart or practical. What worries me more is that lightning fast bill from the dental clinic. The idea could sweep the country and become a model cutting across all age groups. You could get married in a full blown church ceremony with tuxes and gowns and a dinner for 250 guests, and three hours later on your wedding night find a bill for $20,000 on your I Pod.

For sure, this would not be an auspicious beginning for a love traveling through time.

The moral of my saga is that the very next morning after the bill arrived I put a check in the mail for the dental service, reasoning: the way we’re going, Washington could shut down the postal service tomorrow and the next bill might come with 33 per cent interest and immediate cancellation of my bonus tooth paste.

Be smart, America.

Start flossing.

About Jim Klobuchar:

In 45 years of daily journalism, Jim Klobuchar’s coverage ranged from presidential campaigns to a trash collector’s ball. He has written from the floor of a tent in the middle of Alaska, from helicopters, from the Alps and from the edge of a sand trap. He was invited to lunch by royalty and to a fist fight by the late Minnesota Viking football coach, Norm Van Brocklin. He wrote a popular column for the Minneapolis Star Tribune for 30 years and has authored 23 books. Retiring as a columnist in 1996, he contributes to Ecumen’s “Changing Aging” blog, MinnPost.com and the Christian Science Monitor. He also leads trips around the world and an annual bike trip across Northern Minnesota. He’s climbed the Matterhorn in the Alps 8 times and has ridden his bike around Lake Superior. He’s also the proud father of two daughters, including Minnesota’s senior U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar.