Because he’s a human child, sometimes Huck can go crazy with the injustices of his life and really let us have it with the crying and the yelling.  And then there are moments like Valentine’s Day, when he excitedly came off the school bus and revealed his second lost tooth. He so very happily showed me the grotesque and bloody little thing inside his plastic green tooth case that he carries each day in his backpack in the event that he should need it.  He enthusiastically told me the story of how during the 100th day celebration party he was wiggling the tooth with his tongue when it popped right on out, and he immediately put it safely into the container.  As we crossed the street and headed toward home he stopped so he could get the disgusting tooth out and show it to me, especially since he swallowed his first one and thus denied us all the experience of holding it in our hands.  As soon as we entered our home he rushed to the bathroom in order to wash it off so he could lovingly place it  into his tooth fairy pillowcase pocket in hopes of getting rich overnight.  I smiled as I began doing my dear-Lord-the-child’s-home-from-school activities when suddenly I heard gentle sobbing.  I rushed to the bathroom to find him hunched over the bathroom sink quietly weeping because yes, another tooth has been lost forever.  This time down the drain.  And it wasn’t that awful almost-seven-year-old angry crying.  It was like he knew it wasn’t a tragedy, but still so very, very disappointing.  I hugged him and cried a little bit myself, because darn if I wasn’t excited to steal the tooth in the night and replace it with a golden coin.

Obviously we wrote a reasonable note to the tooth fairy and of course she understood and left Huck a dollar coin just like last time.

Parenthood.  Not for the weak.