Lincoln loses a tooth!

Well, it happened last night for Lincoln.  When he woke up, his tooth was gone!  He thought he had swallowed it, but low and behold it was just in his bed sheets.  Phew!  

I had asked him if he would like me to pull his tooth out, and he said no.  Which reminds me of another great first grade tooth story.

Kate is the daughter of one of our kindergarten teachers and a sister of a girl in my class.  She visits my class every Friday to participate in First Grade fun.

Now, I had just witnessed a secretary in the office pull out a tooth with one hard tug earlier that day.  She made it look as easy as pulling a carrot from a carrot patch.  I thought, "I could do that, no problem."  

When Kate arrived, she had a single, top layer tooth sticking out of her closed mouth.  She looked like a scraggly tooth freak.  She looked like she could be from Wilkes-Barre, or worse, Ogden.  This tooth was just begging to be pulled.  I was confident that I was the man to do the job.

I invited Kate to the front of the class and asked her if I could pull the jagged baby central incisor from her mouth.  She seemed excited about this idea and shook her head with glee.  I retrieved a blue tissue from the box, wrapped it around the tooth and pulled with one sharp tug.  Kate let out a small but heart-wrenching "eee!".  The tooth had not budged.  I tried again, and again the "eee!" shrill from her gut.  This time the I felt the tooth move just a tad.  I knew that she was in unbearable pain.  However, the tooth was now laughing at me, mocking me for my weak pulling ability.  The tooth was now my enemy.  It must go.

I continued to pull, using more muscle, first from my feeble biceps, then putting a little back into it.  The children in my class gasped and turned away after each subsequent screech by Kate.  I felt bad for Kate, but I had gone to far and the tooth had to go!  Soon, a stream of blood started to run down my arm and now the girls in my class were screaming.  I asked Kate if I should stop and she nodded "no".  I gave one final pull and I felt and heard the roots rip.  The tooth was free!  

I immediately went to the sink, washed my hands and threw away the blood soaked tissue.  Kate's pain turned to excitement and she held her tooth up with enthusiastic pride.  The kids in the class began to clap and cheer.  The day had been saved.  

I will never pull another tooth out again.