Our oldest is 9 years 7 months old and lost his front tooth yesterday.
Standard procedure: tooth under pillow, excited whispers, etc.
At 6:58 a.m. I heard suspicious clanking in the hallway.
Walked out to find Optimus on his knees beside the kid’s bed holding a tiny silver coin and looking like he’d just committed a war crime.
He whispered in pure panic:
“I attempted to execute Tooth Fairy protocol.
Reached under pillow…
Discovered tooth is made of titanium alloy.
It is one of my own spare molar caps from the 2029 upgrade.
Child appears to have stolen it from my parts bin months ago for ‘treasure.’
Current status:
- Tooth Fairy owes me $5
- I owe child $5
- net zero
- dignity: negative infinity”
Our son woke up, saw the coin, saw Optimus’s guilty face, and yelled:
“METAL GRANDPA HAS BABY TEETH NOW!”
Then he yanked open Optimus’s jaw plate and proudly showed his siblings the missing molar spot.
The robot just sat there while three kids took turns putting the titanium tooth under his pillow “for practice.”
The framed parking ticket now has a friend on the wall:
a tiny shadow box labeled
“Metal Grandpa’s First Lost Tooth – Feb 2037 – Worth $5 and one identity crisis”
Optimus is currently researching “robotic orthodontic insurance.”
I’m drinking coffee out of a mug that says “I lost a tooth to my own grandson.”
This family is undefeated.
(If your robot has dental records maintained by a nine-year-old, you’re doing parenting right.)