The lost tooth

As usual, Callum and I were running late to pick up Logan from school. He had been snacking just prior and noticed his tooth had become quite a bit more loose - to the point that it was bending forwards and backwards and twisting all over the place with the slightest push of his tongue.

It was kind of grossing me out.  I told him why don't you just pull it out?!?

No!!  I want to let it fall out on its own.

And then of course, he started playing with it nonstop.  :)

Because we were late, I let him meander a few feet behind me on the path to the school office while I rushed ahead to grab Logan.  At the same time, I was busily tapping away on my phone, sending this text to Jon:

His tooth is hanging on by a thread! 

Accompanied with this lovely pic to prove it.  Gross right?

Literally as I was hitting send, I suddenly heard Callum BURST into tears behind me.  I turned around and he had stopped dead in his tracks on the path, bawling his eyes out.

My tooth!  My tooth is lost!!

Apparently, at that very moment that he was listlessly shuffling behind me and playing with his hanging-by-a-thread tooth, it DECIDED TO FALL OUT ON ITS OWN.

And, apparently, he caught it for a split second in his hands, but then dropped it.

On the path.

Amidst the most PERFECT place you'd ever want to drop a tooth ever.

No, not really.

Doesn't every grain of sand and every tiny rock look like a tooth to you?

Well, if you can't tell from the pic, in real life, it absolutely does.  Everything in the path is the shape and size and color of a tooth.  *sigh*

Well doesn't that fucking blow.

So my kid's tears are streaming down his face as he has just lost his first tooth.  And I'm staring down at him, looking at the ground, looking at him, looking at the ground.  I was stuck not quite knowing what to do.  I could tell it was going to be an impossible mission to find the tooth.  Meanwhile, in the back of my brain my mind was also screaming at me, YOU ARE LATE!  YOU NEED TO PICK UP YOUR OTHER SON! FORGET THE DAMN TOOTH.

This always happens to me by the way.  Trying to deal with (and prioritize) two conflicting issues for each of my sons, usually on opposite sides of the room, house, school yard, whatever, it's all the same.

So, I looked at poor little Callum and said ok - you can stay here and look for your tooth while I go get your brother to come help us look for your tooth.  Or, you can come with me to get your brother and we'll all three come back to look for your tooth.  Which do you want to do?

He came with me and was already feeling much better.  The first thing he did as we approached Logan was show off his new front gap.

After picking up Logan, and certainly after 10 more kids shuffled past and kicked the poor tooth here and there in the dust, we three arrived back at the spot (or thereabouts! Remember - he was behind me - so I didn't even know where EXACTLY his tooth had fallen out!) to hunt for his tooth.

As you can imagine, after about 5 minutes of half-ass searching, the boys gave up while I stayed bending over, kneeling, scouring the ground, practically on my hands and knees, looking for that damn tooth.  Another Mom heard of our bad luck and joined in the challenge to help me, which was nice since we two also got to catch up on our lives for a bit, but neither of us had any luck.

That damn thing was nowhere to be seen nor found.

Thankfully, Callum didn't seem too upset by the fact that he wouldn't have an actual tooth to hand over to the tooth fairy tonight.  And, in an effort to help, his big brother told him matter-of-factly, I lost my first tooth too. But it's okay, all you have to do is draw a picture of your tooth for the tooth fairy, to leave behind tonight.

So, that's what we did.