My husband, Justin, had a dentist appointment several days ago to replace a broken crown.
At dinner time that night, as I prepped the salad, he came up behind me and whispered in my ear words that would rattle any wife:
“I have a confession to make.”
I thought he was about to tell me he had already eaten to escape having to have the salad.
Never in a million years would I have expected, instead, for what he said to be
“Today when the dentist took my old crown off, she cracked it in half.
When she walked away for a second I saw it laying there in the tray and I took half of it and stuck it in my pocket. She came back in afterwards, and I could see her looking all over for it, but I just sat there with in my pocket and didn’t say anything.”
I thought he was done, but then there was more.
“I have it in my car.”
I just stood there, frozen mid salad-toss, blinking at him.
“Why on earth would you do THAT?”
I finally asked him, ignoring that I am a total hypocrite as I -at that same exact moment – had a witch doctor level of old Tooth Fairy teeth from when the kids were little in my bedroom jewelry box drawer I can’t bring myself to throw away.
“I don’t know. I just feel like me and my teeth have been through a lot together,” he replied.
“I had to confess it to someone. I cleptoed my own molar.
I could no longer keep it inside.”
I don’t know why Disney has never approached us; We’re such a fairytale.
Days later he was rustling around in his car for something when he suddenly exclaimed,
“Oh! Did I ever show you my tooth?!”
There was a strange thrill in his voice, so I sighed and feigned interest like I do when he talks about work related things.
This is when he proceeded to produce the molar he had stolen back from the dentist,
which he – for some reason – still had in the center console of his truck;
And just when I thought THAT part was weird, he added on,
“It has an odd smell I noticed,”
and held the chipped molar bit up to his nose, making it obvious that it was not the first old molar sniff he had even done.
In that moment I suddenly flashed back to standing before the altar, before God and our family, and pledging to stay for better or worse.
This felt like it was definitely one of those.
No need to say which one.
But the end of this tooth saga is one I cannot contain.
The joy that it happened at all feels like bubbles of glee, because a writer knows the perfect end to a story when they live it, and last Wednesday it was right there, happening to me.
My oldest daughter, Alena, had come over to accompany me, Paige, and Chloe to the DMV for yet another driving permit test for Chloe.
(Third time’s the charm, you know. They practically need to make a VIP seating section there for me)
Justin had assessed it must have been me who was the bad luck, as I’d been the only one to take Chloe her other two failed times, so the other day he had said he thought we should all go as a cheering section, rooting her on.
“Maybe that would be just the thing she would need.”
The only thing was, that day he also had his follow-up dentist appointment to put on his permanent crown.
This was inarguably good timing, as his temporary crown had fallen out in a bite of my homemade meatloaf earlier that very day.
He planned to go to his appointment at the dentist and then meet us at the DMV;
One big, loud, traveling pod, as we often tend to be.
We all arrived at the same time.
He was barely even in the automatic door before Justin showed off his new crown to Paige, who wasn’t as impressed as I think he wanted her to be.
Chloe got checked in after the clerk we’ve come to know (may invite him to Thanksgiving) adequately teased her about being a frequent flier there,
he assigned her a testing booth,
and we all went to find seats.
It was there, sitting shoulder to shoulder across from another young family, that Justin reached into his pocket and, in my peripheral vision, started fiddling with something.
I looked over only to see that what he was holding was now his latest temporary crown.
For the actual LOVE!
What WAS IT with him and these teeth?!
“Did you take ANOTHER TOOTH?!” I hissed.
“What on earth did you take another tooth for?!”
He kept turning it in his hand (His Precious)
and he said with a sparkle,
“I don’t know. I thought maybe I’d drill a tiny hole and wear it on a chain.”
At this point, the little girl across the aisle was now scrunching her nose and went to stand closer by her dad.
I assume it was for comfort.
I would have if it was me.
“Alena! He has ANOTHER TOOTH!”
I elbowed her.
“I refuse to look,” she said. “I refuse to give it attention. I don’t even want to see,”
but, Friends,
SEE SHE DID, as in that moment he fumbled and dropped said molar, and that stolen tooth was now ROLLING DOWN THE CENTER WALKWAY OF THE DMV.
“Get it! GET. IT,” I pleaded as Justin dove for his own tooth underneath a stranger’s feet,
and I contemplated how Chloe had asked us to please sit somewhere where she wouldn’t feel us looking at her as she tested.
I thought about how the real gift was her not being able to look at US out there in our natural habitat: causing a big scene.
Finally, after what must have looked to onlookers like a spontaneous game of Twister,
Justin captured the tooth, and I told him that I absolutely forbid him from keeping a molar that had now positively marinated in the DMV.
He carried it to trash right in the center of the room with a look like he was about to put down the family dog;
As somber as if he was holding a funeral.
There he was – My Shining Prince – Forever joined to me.
At first he hesitated at the edge of the can, and I am certain he was just waiting for me not to look for a split second so he could sneak it back into his pocket, hopefully,
but I mouthed to him the way that seasoned moms perfect,
“You. Had. Better. Throw. It. In.”
He did throw it, and as he walked back to his seat
I leaned to Alena, nearly crying laughing, and shook my head.
“Of course. Of COURSE there is now a TOOTH in the trash at the DMV,”
and she said,
“The scary thing is I bet that’s not even the first one.”
Chloe passed her test this time, thankfully.
I know that the only way that happened was that she was assigned a testing booth that made what was going on in the waiting area that day impossible to see.
Mom Outnumbered
Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.
No one can be more funny than family! Life is so much better than fiction.