Some Things are Best Kept to Yourself

I am not a fiction writer. I mean, I can tell you what good novel writing is – I’m a great editor, but do not ask me to invent characters and plot and believable dialogue. It’s just not my forte. Luckily, I have kids, and truth is SO much better/funnier/more interesting than fiction. Times seven sources, I have stories in spades, but this one really takes the cake. (Seriously, I was laughing until I cried.)

I’ve dropped the ball on a lot of things in all our drama this year, like our insurance paperwork. Heh. Once I finally pulled myself together enough to start picking things back up, all my kids were (over)due for dental appointments. I took the two that had visible issues first who happened to be my 5-year-old and not quite 11-year-old boys. (My 11-year-old had a tooth coming in that was blocked by a spacer and had lost a filling -again, and the 5-year-old had a chipped front tooth from when he had gotten a zipper pull stuck between his front teeth. My husband had to clip it with wire cutters and back it out. I’m legitimately amazed that he accomplished it with such minor damage to the tooth. Impressive, right there. I wish I would have been home to see it, actually.) They both got checkups, follow-up appointments because we’re not awesome enough to be a no-cavities family and, of course, a new toothbrush, toothpaste and floss. That night when we were doing our pretty hit-and-miss bedtime “routine”, I reminded both my boys to please throw away their old toothbrushes so there wasn’t crap cluttering up the drawer. AND, THEN I TRUSTED THEM TO DO IT. This was a mistake – kind of rookie mistake, actually. I should totally know better. Ha!

Fast forward to five days later, and I realized just how much I had miscalculated how wrong this could go. Oh, but, I was about to learn. Upon sending my two youngest upstairs to hopefully brush their teeth well enough to not end up with dentures at 30, I checked on my little boy who had been a little slow “putting on his pajamas” that turned out to be a clean pair of jeans and a t-shirt. (You guys are going to seriously think that I make this stuff up for dramatic effect. I assure you, I do not.) As he picked through the bathroom drawer to decide which of the half-squished toothpaste tubes with missing lids he preferred, I asked him where his old toothbrush was. Picking up a few possibilities, I asked him if this was his old one that needed to be thrown away. He assured me that, nope, it wasn’t. This is how the conversation progressed:

Me -“Which one is your old one? Did you throw it away already?”

5-year-old – “Oh, no. I gave them…”

Me, in my head – “You GAVE them to… Oh, please, no. Tell me you did not.”

Me – “You gave them to…?”

5-year-old – “I had my green one like this and the other blue one. I gave them to [my friend]!

I’m not going to lie. I literally burst out laughing out loud until I was crying. (Noooooooo! WHY would you DO THAT?! Ha ha ha ha ha!) Like, I could not stop. And, then I proceeded to tell on him to my 17-year-old daughter and her boyfriend and my 19-year-old daughter and my husband as I was doubled up almost peeing myself. He was confused and miffed as to why this was not the BEST. GIFT. EVER. to give to your friend.  He finally just outright told me to stop laughing at him. (Because, I raise them assertive! All chiefs and no Indians is actually how I describe our family dynamic to people.)

Then, being a responsible and nice neighbor and an all-around decent person, I texted my son’s friend’s mom and gave her a head’s up that my beloved child had gifted her unsuspecting 4-year-old with his used toothbrushes. I almost want to screenshot our conversation, but I won’t out her without her permission as the parent of the child who accepted used toothbrushes. (You’re welcome.) I’ll just sum it up as a brief description of what my son told me, a heartfelt apology for his grossness and a lot of laughing-with-tears emojis.

Seriously, guys, THIS IS MY REAL LIFE. I couldn’t make this up if I tried.