During her second week of school Venus lost her first tooth. It had been wobbly for at least a week, and we knew it was just a matter of time before it was ready to come out.
As you would expect her teacher, obviously very experienced at dealing with a child who has just lost their first tooth without their parents in sight, did everything right. She gave Venus a tissue to bite on, as there was a small amount of blood on her gum. She took possession of the tooth and placed it in the centre of several tissues. She gathered the tissues up and bound them together with string to make the shape of a ghost with the tooth secured safely in the head. Then she drew a face on the ghost and gave it to Venus to give to us. I was most impressed.
Venus was already familiar with the idea of the Tooth Fairy, as she has seen Mars lose many teeth and receive money under his pillow in exchange for the tooth every time. That is to say, every time except once when Mars apparently swallowed the tooth (which, needless to say, was very traumatic), and the Tooth Fairy felt very sorry for him and left him money, even though he failed to produce the tooth.
So we carefully placed her toothy ghost under her pillow that night, and in the morning when she woke up the first thing she said was "Mum, can I look under my pillow?" I told her she could, and when she looked there was a shiny gold coin where her tooth had been.
She picked it up.
"Look Mum! I've got some money!"
She was so excited. Then she took a closer look at it.
"Oh" she said in a slightly disappointed tone. "It's not made of chocolate."
The first thing that stupidly popped into my head was an image of Homer Simpson's brain explaining to Homer that "money can be exchanged for goods and services", but I didn't go there. I said nothing, because there's something precious about a time in your life when a chocolate coin is more exciting than a real one. Even if it is a whole two dollars.
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