Wednesday, September 27, 2006

When you first break your kid.

This is one of the last pictures taken of J when she still had a full set of teeth. Oy. It's okay to let your kids be more than 20 feet away sometimes, right? It's gotta be. I had to be that far away to get the Burley trailer on the bike while they were playing happily near the house, and it only took the usual 3-4 minutes, and then when I was literally within two steps of grabbing them to go for a bike ride, J falls, gets up bloody, and has lost one of her upper front teeth.

I was alone at the time, so I had her crying and B crying because his sister was upset and me trying to find a tooth in a sidewalk made of pea gravel. Never found it before I decided we had to get to the dentist where we were told she'd be fine but toothless for three years until the adult tooth comes in.

It almost doesn't need to be said that when C got home she found the tooth immediately. Then, at school this morning, a former student dropped by to stay hi and I told him the story and he said that if I had put the tooth in milk it would have been fine. So, I guess I'm feeling guilty from my accumulation of three shoulda's:

1. I shoulda a found the tooth.
2. I shoulda known about the milk trick.
3. Upon my first examination of her mouth, I shoulda not have yelled in J's face "Oh my God!! Your tooth is totally gone!!!"

I could live with two, but anytime you rack up three in a five minute period, it's going to eat at you. Especially that third one. That's one I'd advise you to avoid if you ever find yourself in a similar situation.

10 comments:

R. said...

That #3 "shoulda" was by far one of the funniest thing I've ever read. I suppose it could have been worse if you had maybe said something like: "LOOK AT ALL THE BLOOD!"

Tito said...

Fab comment Ryan. Scott, who the hell ever heard of the milk thing? Three kids on and I've never heard it. Yeah, if you eat pop rocks and drink 7-Up your stomach will explode too. Well, just consider it as J getting a good tooth-losing head start on her friends. And make sure the tooth fairy leaves her a reeeeeal nice surprise to make up for Daddy being so irresponsible as to let his child get 20 feet away!!

Mr. Hill said...

Well, the tooth trick was told to me by a high school student who plans to maybe be a dentist some day, so I think he probably knew what he was talking about. In fact, I've been gargling milk the last few days because I figure that it must be good for teeth preservation.

The tooth fairy thing was kind of funny. We had her make an emergency stop that very evening to drop off some new Dora pajamas that we had sitting around waiting for cold weather.

sarahjane said...

that's a great story. it figures a woman can find a tooth hidden in pea gravel in two seconds flat after her husband hunted for much longer. (sorry, but it's true). did you really say, "It's totally gone?"

Mr. Hill said...

I think I did say that. I must have, because she started, you know, freaking out, all "my tooth is gone forever" and stuff.

Bad dad. Very bad dad.

R. said...

Well, look at it this way, she probably won't remember any of it ten years from now. So you should be happy, because that's one less thing she can blame you for when she becomes a teenager.

LetsGoThrow said...

That is exactly the kind of thing that is in your memory forever.

R. said...

Really? I certainly can't remember anything from that age, regardless if it was something traumatic or an important experience. Hell, I only remember missing ONE of my teeth...

Mr. Hill said...

I agree with throw; this day might go down as the dawn of memory for her.

mbh said...

that was definitely the LOL of the day.