Sinking My Teeth into Choir

One lunch recess many years ago, I was in front of my Junior Choir directing them through a song.  The accompaniment was on a cassette tape recorder (I told you it was a while ago) that was on the floor at my feet.  In the middle of the piece, a grade 5 student just to the right of me fell forward.  Had I been one foot further right, she would have fallen into me.  Had I not been looking towards the left part of the choir, I would have seen her.  In either of these scenarios I would have been able to prevent her from falling face-first to the floor.  All I saw was a motion out of the corner of my eye and a collective gasp from the choir.  I looked down and saw one of my own homeroom students, lying face-down on the floor, her limbs twitching.

The first thing I thought of was a seizure.  I quickly bent down to help and heard one of the front row students scream, "What's that!"  I looked to where she was pointing, a few feet from the fallen student and saw a tooth, root and all, on the rug.  The student had fallen face first onto my tape recorder and knocked out her front incisor. 

Just then the bell rang signalling the end of recess.  I pointed at a student and ordered, "Go get the principal!"  As the rest of the choir hustled out, I turned the student over and cradled her and her bleeding mouth until the principal came rushing in.  The student was by then conscious enough for us to walk her to the nurse's room (no nurse, but there was a room).  I had picked up her tooth in a tissue.  I gave it to the principal and told him that it should be put in milk. (Somewhere I had read that milk provides a fairly good electrolyte match for a dislodged tooth.  Gotta love trivia when it's useful.)  I soon heard an all-call for anyone having milk left from their lunch to bring it to the office immediately.

A short while later the principal returned, a cup of milk in his hand, to tell me that they had called the parent, who had called the dentist, and had then called us back.  "The dentist said the tooth needs to be put back in the socket,"

"Ok," I replied, "I'll hold her hand and you go ahead."

"But she's your student, Rick." 

Long pause.

I reached into the cup, fished out the tooth, and making sure it was lined up in the right direction between my thumb and forefinger, I said, "Open up your mouth, honey," and I shoved that tooth as far as I could into the bloody socket.

The next morning she returned to school with the tooth cemented to its neighbour.  "The dentist said it will probably be OK."

And three years later during her Grade 8 Graduation, I noticed it was doing just fine.