These days we’ll take hope anywhere we can find it, and today, that hope comes from an accidental smiley face found in some pasta.
On Tuesday, Matthew Burnside tweeted to announce that his wife had witnessed a miracle. He explained that she “yelled across the house with an urgency” that made him sprint to her side. He thought something horrible had happened, but when he arrived in the kitchen she simply said “look,” and held up a spoon that had three pieces of pasta stuck to it.
Burnside attached a photo of what he saw to the tweet, and as you can see, the pasta pieces accidentally formed a perfect smiley face. 8 )
my wife witnessed a miracle today & yelled across the house with an urgency that had me sprinting. I thought something terrible had happened but when i came into the kitchen she said: Look… pic.twitter.com/KHw0XsQLJU
— Matthew Burnside (@MatthewBurnsid7) May 12, 2020
Burnside later named the adorable pasta face “Saint Spaghettio,” and the sacred sign that not everything in this world is bad went on to brighten the days of so many other people.
*Saint Spaghettio
— Matthew Burnside (@MatthewBurnsid7) May 12, 2020
At the time of writing this article, Burnside’s original tweet had nearly 785,000 likes and more than 129,000 retweets. People found hope in this pasta face, and some even went on to share photos of unlikely smiley faces and shapes they’ve encountered in life.
I understand your wife and did the same thing when I experienced the same miracle chopping onions. I even texted it to my daughter. pic.twitter.com/gMin5Y5Bfy
— Kristine (Sato) Phillips (@ksato_phillips) May 13, 2020
This reminds me of the time I walked into the ladies room and saw the tampon machine having a nervous breakdown. pic.twitter.com/WVcN1fiuoT
— Lady Penni of Kerry 👑 (@Pellington21) May 13, 2020
“I’m happy it seemed to make some people happy,” Burnside told Mashable in a Twitter DM when asked about his viral pasta photo. “It’s a scary and stressful time, and people are taking joy wherever they can find it.”
Burnside is a college instructor who’s in the midst of wrapping up “a very strange semester,” but like so many others, the pasta filled him with a moment of joy and peace.
Do hundreds of thousands of likes prove that we’re extremely desperate for happiness right now? Of course! But the thread is also extremely wholesome, so we love it.