too fast, way too fast

I have this very, very clear memory from my childhood of my aunt saying "where does the time, go?" whenever she met up with us. And I remember thinking to myself that it must be something old people say. I must have been about 5 years old at the time.

Two days ago Kaspar lost his first tooth and I found myself standing in the bathroom by myself, feeling extremely sad. All I could think of was - where does the time go? He is growing up too fast, way too fast... I must be getting old! Very old by 5y old standards, for sure!

Kaspar's baby tooth on the bottom had been moving for a while now, but a couple of days ago he surprised me by asking if I can pull it out. It turns out he had conversed with some of his friends at daycare and school and decided that if he does not get it removed he might swallow it while he's asleep and then WHAT WOULD HE GIVE TO THE TOOTH FAIRY? That was a much more scary thought then having mom remove it, as it turns out.

I was not really into it. I tried with my fingers, it moved, yes. It moved a lot. But... I could not really grab onto it. It did not come out. I breathed a sigh of relief. But Kaspar was not about to give up. A few minutes later he brought me the nail clippers. "Can you pull it out with these?" I laughed. He got mad. And then I tried to scare him by saying that I will have to use my work pliers. Do you think he was scared? Not at all! He thought it was a spectacular idea. He even offered to go and find a pair for me and a few minutes later came down with a very large pair of vice grips. This time we managed to have a laugh together and I came to the conclusion that he was not going to give in and I was going to be pulling out a tooth tonight, like it or not! I tired with a pair of tweezers... and then another pair of tougher tweezers... and finally with a pair of my fine detail pliers I was able to grab on an the tooth came out very easily indeed. Kaspar was thrilled! He was beside himself!

We HAD to call daddy at WORK IMMEDIATELY. And when daddy did not pick up right away, Kaspar proudly told me that he was much braver then daddy. "Is that so?", I asked surprised. And he went into the details of the story how last summer daddy was afraid of letting me pull out a sliver with my tweezers, but you see, he was not afraid to let me pull out his tooth with my pliers. What could I say, but agree that tonight he was braver then daddy. It's amazing how well kids remember details and events. Even if it isn't from a very recent past.

They do grow up too fast and unfortunately I do not have such perfect memory... and I'll probably forget a lot of these little details too soon.