Butt Coins Have No Worth
But(t) they make great stories
A few years ago we were visiting my husband’s family in the Chicago suburbs when my son’s great uncle handed him a silver dollar. Quinn thought that was super cool. He was four and just starting to understand money. You get it, you trade it for cheap plastic toys, repeat.
Later that night, we were chilling in the hotel, spread out on the king sized bed eating Chex Mix and watching Beach House Bargain, when Quinn got real squirmmy.
“What are you doing, buds?” I asked.
“Trying to get my money out,” he answered.
“Out of where?” I asked like a stupid, dumb, middle-aged lady mom. I mean, duh. Where did I think four-year-olds stashed their money?
“Out of my butt,” he said.
Oh for f*ck’s sake, I thought. It’s finally happened. Sticks and stones and broken bones and coinage stuck in a pooter. Some kids stick marbles up their noses, some kids swallow magnets, of course mine is going to treat his butt like an ATM.
“What the hell, kid?” I asked, trying to remain calm, sure there were plenty of qualified people within a two mile radius equipped at digging coinage out of my son’s butt? (EDITOR’S NOTE1: Jesus, woman, did you just say digging coinage out of my son’s butt?! Your kid will be a teenager one day! THE INTERNET IS FOREVER!)
Qualified people such as my life parter, loving husband, and co-creator of this human slot machine who happened to laying two inches away from his son’s currency-filled crack. But yeah, its hard to be able-bodied when you’re face-down in a dirty hotel pillowcase laughing your ass off.
“What money did you put in your butt, dear child?” I asked. Again, super calm because there was no need to get the child worked up and tense. Tense would be about the worst thing to happen here. Tense is what’s going to happen when my son meets Dr. Glovey McLube at the Urgent Care.
“The money Uncle Mike gave me,” he answered with all the nonchalance of someone answering the question, Where do you keep the Vaseline and tweezers?
Oh, sweet relief! A silver dollar, you say? I admit, I’m not the most spatially gifted girl. If you ask me the distance between my home and Trader Joe’s, I will tell you thirty miles (EDITOR’S NOTE: It’s .04 miles) or how tall Quinn is I might guess two and a half feet (EDITOR’S NOTE: he’s 4’10”. But what’s a couple feet when talking about your child’s physical appearance?) But even I could determine a silver dollar could not fit into a four year-old’s…well, I don’t need to paint you a picture. But OMG, what if I did? What a horrible picture!
So I helped Quinn out of his PJ’s, and very gently jostled him a titch and wouldn’t you know it, there dropped the silver dollar! Jackpotty!
“Honey Bear,” I started, again in my calm mommy voice. “Please don’t put money anywhere near your butt. That could have been scary.”
“But why?” he asked.
“Because money is dirty. And if anything gets stuck inside your body, we’d have to go to a doctor to have it removed. And that might not feel good.”
Got to grab those teachable moments when they jump in front of you and down your kid’s Thomas the Train jammies.
And to prove he fully understood the magnitude of the situation and was appropriately repentant, he said, “Smell it.”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Smell my butt coin!”
“No thank you, I’m not smelling your butt coin!
“Pleaaaaaaaaaaaase???”
“No, baby bear I will not. Not ever.”
So calm.
“SMELL MY BUTT COIN!”
“Please leave me alone, thank you.”
“EAT IT, MOMMY!”
Oh to hell with calm!
“Jesus Christ on a cracker, GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!”
“EAT IT!!!!”
Calm mommy left my body and was locked in a panic room with a can of Lysol and a flare gun. It was up to me to save myself! I jumped from sleeper sofa to bed to desk to shower stall back to bed to mini fridge to sleeper sofa and back again trying to loose the little loot tooter. But he was buoyed by his love of butts, poop, farts, being disgusting, and his dad’s encouraging hysterics. He was relentless in his pursuit.
“I’M YOUR MOTHER!” I yelled. “WE DON’T TREAT MOTHERS LIKE THIS!”
“SMELL IT. SMELL IT NOW!”
“Make your dad smell it!” I shouted. “GIVE DADDY YOUR BUTT COIN!”
I…I…I don’t know what to say. I can’t explain. I said – no – yelled those words. I know our neighbors heard me because I could hear them uncap a pen through those walls. Give daddy your butt coin. Go on, sweetie. Give daddy your butt money so he can get you a Pepsi and some M&Ms. How much are butt coins worth? In a hotel vending machine that order is at least $6.75.
Quinn seemed to remember we had another adult in the room, another potential customer to rub that tainted2 coin all over. As soon as his neck turned .04 degrees towards his dad, I pounced from the dresser to the bed, knocking Quinn off balance. As he bounced on the mattress (his favorite game!), his palms opened instinctually to cushion his fall, giving me just enough time to swipe that gross coin out of mid-air and lock it and myself in the bathroom.
“MOMMY!” My child’s sweet, tiny fingers curled under the door reaching, pleading. The same sweet, tiny fingers that tried shoving a silver dollar where the sun don’t shine.
“Aw, Mom!” Quinn pleaded. “I need it! Give me back my butt coin.”
I scrubbed it down with Marriott branded body wash, shampoo, and conditioner. Then hid it in Bart’s toiletry bag.
“Sorry, kid,” I said, returning to my spot on the mattress. “Your money is no good here.”
“Mommy, snuggle me.”
And just like that my baby was back. Sugar and spice and butt coins and lice.
“I love you baby bunny,” I said, while caking his body in hand sanitizer.
“I farted!” he said. “SMELL IT!”
That’s my boy.
Thanks for reading, friends! Sorry (not sorry) about all the butt talk. But3 who doesn’t love butts? Don’t unsubscribe.
XO!
Shelly
JK! I don’t have an editor! I mean, obvi.
Yeah, I went there.
Can’t stop won’t stop
OMG, I am not (yet) willing to sniff those coins...