Yikes

The other day, J asked me to do something that appalled me. And impressed me. And grossed me out. I’ll give you a hint. . .

“Oh, no!” you might be thinking.

Oh, yes.

Here’s  the other end of the string:

This was all J’s idea. I wouldn’t do this to a child unless the child begged. She begged. And it’s even crazier because I remember that when I was little, if anyone wiggled their tooth around my dad, he’d immediately threatened to tie a string from tooth to doorknob and slam it and we’d shriek and cower or flee. The whole idea sounded terrifying to me.

I encountered J struggling to get the string tied onto her tooth by herself. I managed to tie it. Then she wanted my help with the doorknob, too. “Really?” I asked. Really, she said. I tied it, and then she stood at the ready. “Really?” I asked again. “Are you sure that you want me to slam it?”

Yes, yes, yes. She really, really did.

I shut my eyes and slammed the door.

She shrieked.

In triumph.

The tooth had flown free.

It’s always been the Tooth Fairy’s policy at our house to leave a single golden dollar. While we were visiting her cousins a few weeks ago, Anna mentioned that she’d just lost a tooth, and J asked what the tooth fairy had left her. “Five dollars,” said Anna. J turned and looked at me significantly, opening her eyes wide with a huge life-is-so-unfair look. Indeed, life is unfair. Even after making her tooth sail across the room through a dramatic act of will and suffering through the disappointment of getting nothing the first morning because the tooth fairy is  clearly incompetent, J still only got one golden dollar.