When tinny strains of bad '80s pop started pumping out of the speakers in the Thai restaurant, it felt like an atmosphere mismatch. But after taking a few seconds to adjust, Pär and I decided to go with it. Suddenly Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer" became just the right accompaniment for our tom ka gai. We started doing that little headbanging thing at our table.

"Back when I was nineteen and had a job assembling circuit boards," Pär said, "I made a couple of mix tapes that I used to listen to all day long, the same tapes over and over again, and this song was on one of them. I must have heard it... oh, at least four hundred times."

"That's a lot of times," I remarked, applying myself to the soup.

"Seriously, at least that many times."

I gave him a sympathetic look.

"No, it's a great song!" he said, then astonished me by singing along: "Ohh we've got to hooold on, to what we've got, doesn't make a difference if we're ready or not..."

"You know lyrics!" I exclaimed. "You actually know English song lyrics!"

"I know how the syllables sound," he corrected me. "I can sing along with them while the song is playing."

"Still, that's more than you usually notice."

"Four hundred times, Karen."

"I guess that would do it."

Driving home, we were merry from good food and the delight of having spent a couple of baby-free hours alone together. I turned on the radio and as fate would have it, Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer" was playing. I sang along with the chorus.

"Ohhh... we're halfway there, OH-OHHH! Livin' on a prayer! Take my hand, and we'll make it I swear, OH-OHHH! Livin' on a prayer!"

Pär, in the passenger seat, suddenly got very quiet. I glanced over at him. "What?"

"Oh... nothing," he said, staring at his hands.

"What?"

He coughed. "I used to think they were singing something different for that line."

"What did you think they were singing?"

He muttered quietly to himself.

"Aw, come on..." I coaxed.

"'Living on bread'."

"Living on bread?"

"Living on bread."

My lips twitched. "Did you think this before you heard the song four hundred times, or after?"

"...After."

"When did you figure out what the real words were?"

"...Just now."

We both looked straight ahead through the windshield for a moment. There are times in any relationship when it's best to say nothing at all.

And then, there are times when you just have to rag mercilessly on the other person.

"Living on bread?"

Pär uttered a strangled cry and buried his face in his hands.

"You thought Bon Jovi was writing pop songs about having to survive on nothing but bread? I mean, maybe if they were a Russian band, but... my god, that's depressing! Just what kind of hellish stark winters did you have over there in Sweden, anyway?"

"You know I never listen to lyrics!" he said.

"How can you have heard this song four hundred times -- 'living on a prayer' is the one line that gets repeated over and over in the chorus -- it's the one line everyone knows -- it's the name of the damn song! -- and in all that time it never occurred to you to think about why these big-hair party boys from Jersey would be living on bread?"

"I just thought they liked bread," he said.

I looked at him. He smiled happily at me.

"I like bread," he added.

We pulled up to a stop sign; I leaned over and kissed him.

We sang "livin' on bread" at the top of our lungs all the way home.