Love in the Time of Ushanka

This column originally appeared in the Nashville Scene.

As a general rule, my husband and I get along pretty well. I like to think it’s because we’re very similar and see eye-to-eye on everything … well, almost everything. The only point on which we can’t agree is on what constitutes appropriate attire. He mocks my pointy-toed shoes and calls them “witchy”; I wince each time he wears the bolo tie he bought on a lark in New Mexico. He has no appreciation for the oversized scarves I’ve taken to winding around my neck until I resemble the Michelin man; I roll my eyes each time he pulls out his “vintage” bodybuilder tank tops for the gym.

At times, our fashion battles have been epic. There was, for example, The Great Pajama Bottom Controversy of ’08, when Hubs wore a pair of holiday-themed flannel pants to coach an indoor soccer game and I had to sit red-faced in the stands, listening to the amused comments. When we got home, I pleaded with Hubs to reserve his jammies for the bedroom.

“They’re not jammies!” he retorted. “They’re Zoobas!”

“What are Zoobas?!” our 14-year-old asked.

“Eighties weightlifting pants.”

It was worse than I had realized. “Hubs,” I said. “Old Navy sold them to me with the understanding that you would be wearing them as pajamas. Not Zoobas. That makes Old Navy look bad. And another thing. They’re Christmas pants.”

“They’re not!” he said. “They’re pirate pants! Look! Skulls!”

“Skulls wearing red and green Santa hats.”

“Those are pirate hats!”

“Pirates don’t wear POMPOMS at the ends of their hats!” I hissed.

“Well, I don’t care. I like my Zoobas and I’m going to wear them,” he declared. And he did.

Equally bad was the Very Ugly Trousers Debacle of ’07. Hubs found a great online deal on a pair of red trousers and ordered them. When they arrived, we learned why they were so cheap.

“They’re not red, they’re coral!” I said as we both stared glumly at his purchase. “Send them back!”

“But they were only 10 dollars,” he said. “Returning them would be more trouble than it’s worth. I’ll find a use for them.” He brightened. “I’ll wear them to work!”

“Ha ha!” I shouted after him. “Very funny!” He didn’t answer, but I hoped he got the message.

He didn’t.

A few days later, Hubs wore the trousers to work. I said nothing, imagining his co-workers would say for me what needed to be said. But when he returned home that evening, he had a big smile on his face. “Everyone was talking about my trousers,” he said.

“And what were they saying?”

“Stuff like, ‘Are you a metrosexual now?’ ” He looked pleased.

I sighed. “Hubs, you’ve got to get rid of those trousers! They are totally fugly.”

“No they’re not!” he laughed. Then he paused and grew serious. “Yes, they are,” he said quietly. “But I don’t like to waste things.”

That’s when I understood that my husband’s occasionally misguided sense of style wasn’t so much about trying to be different. It was about conservation. Why get new pants when he had a brand-new (albeit coral) pair hanging in the closet?

This season, Hubs’ fashion troubles have come to a head. Literally. Each year when it snows, my husband dons a Russian hat known as an ushanka to do live reports for Channel 4 News. In the past, it didn’t elicit much more than the occasional chuckle. But between last year and this one, something happened to that hat, something that can be summed up in this Tweet I happened to catch online from a Channel 4 viewer:

“What died on Dennis Ferrier’s head?”

That was harsh, but I had to admit the woman had a point. A close look at the hat revealed that its wool interior had become matted. Its earflaps sagged. Its sheepskin was worn and discolored. It looked as if our dog had perhaps used the ushanka as a plaything at some point, and it also seemed to have shrunk, since Hubs no longer wore it pulled down over his ears, but instead perched it atop his head like a child’s hat made of newspaper.

“Hubs,” I said gently, after yet another one of my readers made a reference to seeing “that hat thing” on television. “I think it might be time to retire the ushanka.”

He bristled. “I’ve had that hat for 20 years,” he said.

“I know,” I replied. “That’s kind of my point.”

“People like the ushanka!” Hubs insisted. “It makes them laugh!”

“And not in a good way!” I retorted.

That was it. While we’re ordinarily the best of friends, Hubs glared at me as though I’d just said I’d bought a $500 ticket to see Sarah Palin. I glowered back at him like he’d announced another school snow day. And that’s when I realized that while we had vowed to love each other for better or for worse, in sickness and in health … we’d never said anything about ushankas.