Lost (Tooth) and Found (Joy)

It’s been a rough week around these parts.  Fevers, flu, general holiday malaise that takes up residence, like a familiar and demanding house guest. As karma for being the only member of the household who didn’t get their flu shot, I was bitten by the mother of all flus.  Forgive me, flu shot, for I have sinned in leaning out of you this year.  I vow not to make that same mistake again.

But enough about my fever, aches, and chills.

Just as I started to feel the tiniest bit human again, Mary Tyler Dad came down with it.  This guy never gets sick, like ever, so when he does, I pay attention.  Poor honey.  And, alas, tonight the baby went to bed with a slightly elevated temp.  It seems our home is not yet done with this beast.

In this midst of all this sickness and ick, Mary Tyler Son crawled into my bed this morning waking me up with a gleeful whisper in my ear, “I lost my tooth, Mom!”

My second child had just lost his first tooth.  We laughed, I cried, there was a moment we shared, he and I, together, as Daddy showered in the next room.  He put it in the basket of my palm and I gingerly held this second child’s first tooth.  We both shared our fascination of the root in the center, marveled at how small it actually was, beamed with pride and joy.

I carefully placed the little chip of enamel on my nightstand and snuggled in with the boy.  As we waited for the day to begin, I thought about how happy Mary Tyler Son losing his tooth would have made Donna.  Seriously — the girl would have been thrilled.  In those quiet moments in the dark December morning, I could feel it.  As the boy laid on that same spot in the bed where his sister died, it was potent.  He was growing up. Donna approves of this.  And so do I.

Whatever hassles crossed my path today, and, let me tell you, there were more than a few, there was this constant undercurrent of joy buzzing along. Tonight the Tooth Fairy will make her very first stop to our familial home. We are initiated, my husband and I, finally, into another phase of parenthood.

And there, peeking out just behind the new gaping hole in his mouth, Mary Tyler Son has the beginnings of a brand new tooth cresting his gums. Both of my boys are prodigious in the tooth making department these days! Rejoice!

Something so basic, so very basic, has seemed to restore my faith and trust that everything will be alright.

My boy is growing up.  Things are falling out of his body and other things are popping up to replace them.  Exactly as is supposed to happen. Precisely as is expected.  Nature is taking its course.  Biology is a freaking genius.

The miracle of this is not lost on me.

I am so very grateful.