The Saga of THE LOOSE TOOTH

The Saga of the LOOSE TOOTH

A few days before Christmas Marc, Mary Catherine and the boys stopped by for a while so Marc could analyze my computer problems. Anthony had a tooth that apparently had been loose for a while already. It seemed to take up all his attention. Various removal techniques were offered to get the tooth to pop out. Although Anthony was open to most of the suggestions he insisted that no one else could actually put their finger in his mouth to do the removal because he was sure it would hurt – and he was probably right.

I remember my grandmother’s quick tooth removal method. She would pretend to look at the tooth and then suddenly her thumb would come down quickly and BAM, the tooth would be out. Of course we cried because it HURT – for all of a second, but the tooth would be gone.

One of the suggestions to Anthony was to tie dental floss on the tooth and pull. We had trouble getting the floss around the tiny tooth, but all we succeeded in doing was get the tooth to bleed a little. The floss kept slipping off – and of course since Anthony was the one doing the pulling, as soon as he felt the pressure he would stop.

Aunt Debbie tried to get her fingers around the tooth, but that didn’t work either. Although I didn’t want to get the reputation that my grandmother had, I convinced Anthony to let me try to grab hold of the tooth. Difficult as it was, I finally got my fingernails around the small, loose tooth and when Anthony felt it he pulled his head back – and the tooth was out. Now the bleeding scared him – but only for a minute. The tears stopped when he realized that the tooth was out!!! Admiring the hole in is mouth and the promise of the tooth fairy visit outweighed any discomfort that lingered…….I just hope it was the Tooth Fairy that made the visit and not the Book Fairy!