Isn’t it magical how, in an increasingly cashless society, the tooth fairy never disappoints?
How she always manages to find shiny coins in the middle of the night to place under the pillows of slumbering heads?
This was *kind of* the sentiment I experienced last week – a sentiment every other parent or carer will recognise – when the long-wobbly front tooth of my youngest finally succumbed, leaving behind a gummy gap.
I rarely carry coins in my purse these days, relying on my phone to pay for almost everything. Which is fine until the shop you’re in doesn’t accept it or your phone runs out of battery.
But thankfully the tooth fairy doesn’t have to look under sofa cushions, in the kitchen ‘drawer of chaos’ or every coat pocket in the house in order to dig out the ‘going rate’.
That rate is between £1 and £2 in our home – although inexplicably the tooth fairy once left 73p in an eclectic mix of 10, five, two and one pence pieces.
What with having three boys within three and a half years, she’s been a regular guest at our house for a while.
How thorough is your tooth fairy?
On this note, here’s a school gate game for you.
Ask a mum what has happened to all the teeth that have fallen from her child’s mouth.
There are two camps.
The first (my kind of mum) say they have no idea. They can’t remember ever seeing said teeth again.
The other camp say they are stored lovingly in special boxes – sometimes, even shaped like a mouth so you can place each tooth in sequence.
I smile and die a little inside at answers like this, wondering if it’s creepy or if I’m just jealous that their tooth fairy is so organised.
Guaranteed, this camp of parent also has a photo album for each birthday on a shelf in chronological order, along with memory boxes of baby momentoes and special lockets for first curls of hair.
But back to teeth.
Who is the tooth fairy? And what is she doing in my bedroom drawers?
Occasionally the question of what the tooth fairy does with all my boys’ teeth comes up and I talk of magical worlds where they are stored in jars nestled between clouds and star dust.
And I smile as I watch their faces and enjoy these magical moments of childhood.
So far, so wholesome.
Then, this happened:
Pottering downstairs one night, I heard a very loud shriek of “MUMMY” from my bedroom.
Running up the stairs two at a time I found Chester, aged seven, with an ashen face.
When I asked what was wrong, he took a while to tell me what had just happened.
Shaken, he said: “I just opened the drawer beside your bed and it was full of… it was full of… teeth.”
“Teeth?”
“Yes, teeth.”
“Oh.”
“Why do you have a drawer full of teeth Mummy?”
It was a good question.
Why did I have lots of little teeth? Why?
“It’s a good question.”
I was stalling for time.
And then, it struck me.
“Ah, so that’s where she put them.”
“Who?”
“The tooth fairy of course. She leaves some behind so mummies can keep them and buy special little ‘first teeth’ boxes for ever and ever.”
“Oh. Ok. And how will you be able to tell whose tooth is whose when there’s three of us?”
“Huh? Oh, is that the time? Let’s get your teeth brushed before bed.”
Lots of ways to show you care
As the years go by, children learn their parents don’t have all the answers.
“What is the tooth fairy doing with all the teeth?” https://t.co/fJIC5hq5CS
— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) October 12, 2022
But I’m hoping my explanation of what the tooth fairy has been up to was at least good enough to reassure him his mum isn’t leading a double life as a weird tooth collector.
Maybe she’s just a scatterbrain who might never get round to being given a first tooth box, a memory chest or a baby photo album by the tooth fairy or anyone else.
But her heart and intentions were in the right place.
Do let me know what camp you’re in.
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