The Tooth Stealer

What’s something you used to believe as a kid that seems ridiculous now?

It didn’t start with questioning the guy with the white beard . It was the tooth lady. Something wasn’t making sense. The math wasn’t mathing. At the age of six I started to have questions – which is also when my baby teeth started to fall out. I can’t remember why I started to question things, but it didn’t really make sense that there would be money under my pillow from a tiny being that would then take my teeth. What are you doing with my teeth, ma’am?!

So it just clicked one day. I received confirmation from the parental unit about my suspicions. But then my brain immediately rapid fired into questions about the bunny and the man with the beard. I asked for confirmation that these individuals were also not of the reality realm. I received confirmation. 😑

In that moment, as a six-year-old, I had cracked the code. I might as well have had a full-time job working 80 hours a week carrying a briefcase and a 30 year mortgage because I had it all figured out. The world had lost its shine.

But it really hadn’t. Because the teeth would weirdly keep getting stolen and now the cash payment could just happen in the open. Like a drug deal maybe. (But where are my teeth???) And the bunny would still bring candy, but the bunny had a different name, a human one. And the guy with the beard still had plenty of jobs at the malls, but after the disclosure, the presents would arrive a day earlier, via a different method of transportation. So that worked out well.

Long after the disclosure of the bearded guy, there was a man from a place I used to work who would dress up as the bearded guy every holiday season and ride through my neighborhood on a fire truck. Parents would give the bearded guy gifts in advance and he would come to every door and give the little children their gifts. He would drive by our house every year and we would wave from the door. Since we knew this bearded guy, it was quite exciting. He stopped doing it and we missed that. And in fact, I hadn’t worked at this place since college so I hadn’t seen the bearded guy, who was at the time a young guy with dark hair and a dark beard, but dressing up as the guy with the white beard.

Yesterday, I was in my backyard, and my neighbor told me her godfather was helping her with her shed. I looked at this helper, and I saw a man with striking white hair and a beard and the way he walked was quite familiar. So I asked my neighbor if her godfather was the guy with the beard from the fire truck and she said yes. It’s been years, but his transformation is complete: he is now the white bearded man from the firetruck! We chatted for a long while, and it was good to see him again. I should have mentioned to him his old gig as the white bearded guy on the fire truck, but I didn’t. I forgot. I really think he’s missing out on an opportunity now, though. He wouldn’t even have to really dress up. Just that red suit thing and the belt.

Happy Saturday/Caturday! 🎅🏻