The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

Yesterday my beautiful wife (BW for short) said to me: "You're the best thing since sliced bread," an idiom that I've heard before, but never applying to me.

This set me to thinking. If I'm the best thing since sliced bread, does that mean I play second fiddle to an overgrown yeast reaction cut up into thin pieces? I thought about all the possibilities. Maybe it was just a hyperbole wherein the exaggeration was "since sliced bread" meaning since, like, forever, you know? Then I thought, "maybe she really means it." Then I thought, "well, I could ask the blog world what she means." Then I thought, "I could just ask her what she means."

So I went back into where she was, and I said, "You know how you said I was the best thing since sliced bread?"

"Mmmmhumm"

"Well, does that include or exclude sliced bread?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I mean am I better than sliced bread or not?" I enquire, trying not to look too concerned by the matter.

"I'm gonna have to go with the sliced bread on this one."

"Uh huh." I wonder if I should be concerned.

"So, this sliced bread fetish.... What's so great about an overgrown yeast reaction cut up into thin pieces?"

She responded by telling me about how on her mission in Russia, they didn't have sliced bread. So basically, I'm the best thing that has happened to her since her mission.

I'm okay with that explanation. (It does leave my ego intact, which is a bonus...) We've talked about how we are glad we met when we did. We are grateful for the life experiences we were able to have before we met such that we were the people we were when we met. The version of BW that I fell in love with is the post-mission, post-foreign-exchange experience BW. The version of me that she fell in love with is the version who went though all of my life experiences up to that point. Take away any of those life-shaping experiences, and what you're left with is a different person.

So, with that in mind, I'm okay that I'm the best thing to happen to her since sliced bread. Ok. Cool.

And dear, for the record, you're the best thing to happen to me since the killer rat-infested, monstrous cockroach laden, sewer-flooded streets of Brazil, too. I love you! :)