(no subject)

[arliss]

The Tooth Fairy was a big deal at our house. I still have all the notes (with baby teeth folded into some of them) the kids wrote to the Tooth Fairy. The older child held onto his baby teeth forever, while the younger child was shedding them like a winter coat. So I told the elder to leave a note for the Tooth Fairy and see what response he got. The Tooth Fairy always left a note in reply, and it was folded in a special way (You know how you passed notes in fifth grade? With the paper folded on a diagonal and then in half and then in quarters with the point tucked in, so nobody could figure out where the opening was? Like that.). And when they were very small the Tooth Fairy printed, and when they learned cursive the Tooth Fairy wrote in very careful cursive (that looked like the writing of elementary school teachers). And when the Tooth Fairy was sick, the Tooth Wizard made her rounds. Sometimes they would leave a note for the Tooth Fairy when there was no tooth, and they weren't asking for money--just a note. And they never went to bed a second night without mentioning, just to the air, in general, that they had left a note for the Tooth Fairy.

I cleaned out my dresser recently, and found the box of notes, folded small, some with a lumpy corner. I didn't open any of them and read them. But I couldn't throw them away. Not yet.