An old friend moves into the neighborhood

When my husband and I moved to Rochester in 1986, I was five months pregnant with our first child.  Brand new to town, one of the first things we did was to ask our friends to recommend a dentist.

One of my husband's coworkers suggested the dentist he and his family went to, Dr. George Privitera, who worked out of a residential-looking house on North Winton Road in Irondequoit.

We really weren't in much of a position to do a whole lot of research into the matter, so we decided to trust our friend's judgment, and made our first appointments, hoping that we liked these guys.

Boy, did we.  Almost 30 years later, we're still going to Privitera Dental. We've got three grown children now, and all three went to Privitera. We moved to Webster 20 years ago, and still, every six months (or more often for bonus "filling" visits), we drive to Irondequoit to visit "our" dentist.

But starting next week, that's going to change. No, no, we haven't decided to dump our dentist after all this time. Turns out, our dentist is moving closer to us.  After 55 years at their Irondequoit office, Privitera Dental is moving to Webster.

The move is a pretty good indication of how the practice has grown over the years. Back at the beginning, Dr. George Privitera ran the shop himself.  In 1987 (coincidentally, the year we started going there), his son Steve joined the practice. For a while, father and son worked side by side, until Dr. George finally took a well-earned retirement several years ago.

So now, Dr. Steve is ushering the practice into a new era, with a brand new office, much closer to his Webster home, and ours.  Located at 1695 Empire Blvd., the office is at least twice the size of the little Irondequoit house, with three large treatment rooms, a spacious waiting area, and lots of lab space.

Everything else, though, will stay the same, I'm sure. The great service. The smiles I get when I walk in the door. That feeling of being part of a family practice.

Even the old black treasure chest will be there, just like it has been for more than three decades, delighting children for years to come with the surprises inside.

So, even though my kids will move on and find their own dentists some day, Jack and I will probably be going to Privitera for another 30 years. Basically, until our teeth start falling out.

Wait. That's not going to happen. 'Cause we have a really good dentist.

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