I practiced dentistry for 35 years. I am at present retired three years. I still wonder how I have managed to go from a life full of brisk industry to a less hectic existence. Occasionally and without warning, bits of my past, harried life break back into my consciousness. I have no control over them.

The incident which I am about to relate happened about 15 years ago.

I was getting tired of the commute into Jamaica, Queens every day, and I decided to investigate dental practices in Nassau County. I could save an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening. It would also make it easier to go to my children's soccer games and my soccer games, as well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. I started to look.

I love Hicksville, as do my wife, Lorraine and my three kids. I adore Hicksville. The people I met in Hicksville schools and the Hicksville American Soccer Club were the nicest, warmest and most down-to-earth people on earth.

Why travel to Jamaica, Queens? Look in Hicksville!

In the "Professional Practices" section of the Sunday New York Times, I pored over the 50 - 100 ads. Eliminate all ads from New Jersey, Westchester, Suffolk, Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn and Staten Island, I decided. Seek out the 516 telephone numbers in Nassau County.

Eureka! I had found it! It sounded good. Space up for sale in Hicksville. An appointment was set for noon on Wednesday, my day off, with the property owner. It was arranged. We would speak at the office, and after a walk-through of the premises, we would go to lunch.

The doctor who was selling was about 75 years old. The dental equipment looked even older than he did. He was a kind, gentle, good-natured chap, and we had an instant rapport. He moved slowly as he showed me the ancient dental equipment. These were museum pieces or relics which I recognized from dental history courses I had taken at NYU. He had almost no patients, and his yearly receipts from dentistry kept him barely above welfare subsistence. At lunch, I learned that his wife was a teacher who was the major wage earner in the family.

I knew I would not purchase the office, but why spoil a pleasant lunch with a lovely person and a dental colleague? As we ate and spoke, we learned about each other, about dentistry and, finally, about mortality. He was getting on in years, and it was time to sell the practice.

He had an unusual surname, and I questioned him about it.

I said, "You have a very distinctive name, doctor. There was a dentist in Jamaica, Queens, one block from my office, with the exact same second name." I continued, "He was very rich and successful. He lived on Park Avenue, and he commuted to Jamaica every day in a chauffeured limousine. He's dead. He died about six months ago."

"Sure, I knew him," said my lunch companion. "He was my brother." He stated that fact without a trace of emotion.

From out of my unfeeling mouth came a question, which I blurted out in bad taste. "How did you handle having so rich and successful a brother, when you weren't as economically secure and prosperous as he was?"

He looked at me without speaking for what seemed too long a period of time. I had touched a raw nerve, but he did not seem ill at ease. I was the one who had transgressed. He was pondering the question seriously, and he stated the answer quite matter-of-factly.

"Well, he is dead, and I am still alive. I guess I won."

"Wow," I said to myself. "Never underestimate sibling rivalries."

I shook the good doctor's hand, and we parted, never to meet or converse with one another again.