Somewhere in Time

Many have commented to me that a certain recent blog celebrating the mustache in it's historical heyday reminds them of my husband. I wanted to pose him for a picture that could be mistaken for one on said blog, but he would not cooperate. Instead, this is the closest I could come in creating one:



I have always felt Matthew has a timeless sense about him. The first time I met him he sat in the corner of a class I was TAing and looked contemplative. I immediately thought "Young Werther" and thus he was in my mind that 18th century tragic hero. The curly fair hair and antique spectacles* helped my illusion.

Then on our first date, Matt dressed up as a beatnik with thick-rimmed 1950s glasses. This made some of my roommates uneasy, not because they feared Kerouac, but because they feared the unknown.** I thought it was a big joke because my favorite was making roommates uncomfortable, but he looked at home in his get-up as much as in a t-shirt and jeans.

Later after we started dating, my opera-loving friend commented to my more cosmopolitan roommate that Matt often wore army surplus. My roommate, not having seen him in his army clothes, was somewhat troubled by this because she thought of the army surplusers as more conservative/traditional than her impressions of him. When she did see him in army surplus, she decided he wore it ironically.

I think his timelessness helped him fit in in Europe so well, not completely anachronistic but not completely sold on today, the combination of a duffel coat, England soccer jersey, fountain pen and ipod. But even in the Alps wearing completely normal clothes, he looks like a great romantic Caspar David Friedrich painting:




* Really, his glasses come from his grandmother's extensive antique collection. He put them on one day and he could see, so she made them a graduation present.

** Favorite roommate story from that year: I was listening to some British Asian music in my room when my roomie walked in and asked me if I could turn it off since the singer was swearing. I blinked, turned it off, and said "I didn't know you spoke Punjabi!"