Did you know professors can fall in love, too? This year, The Argus talked to professors at the University who are together to hear their stories of academia, romance, and everything in between. 

Susanne Fusso is a professor of Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies. Joseph Siry is a professor of art history.

The Argus: First off, I’ve just been asking people: How did you meet?

Susanne Fusso: We’re not sure when we met. I mean, we were aware of each other as colleagues. We met here. But we’ve tried to figure out exactly the moment that we met, and we have not been able to.

Joseph Siry: I had a memory of Susanne as a colleague who was in my world. She once gave a presentation at an exhibition that she curated. There was a work of one of her Russian friends who’s an artist. And I do remember that event. I remember how interested she was in presenting her friend’s work, and that was clearly very meaningful for her.

A: And then, when did you two start dating?

SF: We got to know each other. We knew each other at Wesleyan, but I actually was married to somebody else. But after the divorce, I started going to church in the First Church of Christ on Court Street, the Congregational church. And Joe started going there at the same time, and it was really at church that we started talking to each other. And I don’t know if I’d call it dating, but we used to have lunch every Thursday.

A: What year did you two get married?

JS: That was Oct. 5, 2003.

SF: It was a great event. We didn’t have a church wedding, in the sense that the event was just our wedding. We did it during the church service. So it was in the church, but all the people from the church were there, and then all our friends came. We filled the church with like 300 people.

A: Do you two have rules about talking about school when you’re at home? Do you try to separate the two in some way?

JS: Well, we do talk about other things, but we have a lot of collegial involvement with Wesleyan…. [We have] different departments and different sets of colleagues, different sets of students. As far as I know, we don’t have rules. We’ve shared students over the years. 

SF: I was friends with a lot of people in Joe’s department before Joe and I got together. So that was kind of nice because they all were very excited that the two of us got together. 

JS: We’re constantly aware of each other’s work. Susanne’s a super good editor. She reads everything I do. 

SF: Joe reads everything I do.

SF: It’s good to have someone who’s not in your field read it [work] because you want it to be understandable to people outside your field. You know, I’ve learned a lot about architecture from being with Joe, and I think he’s learned more about literature than he wanted to know.

A: On that note, when I’ve been crowdsourcing questions from friends for these interviews, one [always] comes up: What’s the nerdiest or most academia-y thing that you two have done together?

SF: Seems like our whole life.

JS: Good question.

A: What are your plans for this Valentine’s Day?

SF: As far as what we’re actually going to do on Friday, I think we’ll just go home and have dinner exhausted from a day of work. But Joe, do you have any other plans? Usually try to go out for dinner. Very boring—I’m sorry.

JS: We have deferred dinner plans. We’re going to see people in March. 

A: I’m curious. You said you share students sometimes. How often do students realize you’re married? Is that a funny thing that comes up?

SF: Sometimes they know, sometimes we tell them. We had one student [we shared in classes]. This was maybe 20 years ago. She was a Russian major, but she also took several courses with Joe. She’s come back for [reunions], and we thought of her as a kind of a mutual friend.

A: You mentioned time moving quickly during the semester. When you get home, what are some of your favorite activities to do together? 

JS: I usually cook dinner, and then Susanne reads to me while I’m cooking.

SF: Murder mysteries. And then every evening, we watch about half an hour of something on my laptop. And that’s got to be totally undemanding and unintellectual. And our favorite thing is British mysteries, preferably at least 20 years old. So at the moment, we’re rewatching the Inspector Morse series, which we’ve already watched all the way through at least twice.

A: What do you envision for your post-Wesleyan future?

SF: Well, we’re kind of scared about the future right now, but, yeah, I’m looking at retirement. I don’t think Joe is even thinking about it. He’s perfectly involved and engaged, and I just don’t see him wanting to retire. So my vision is I’m going to stay home and do whatever I want while he’s at work. 

JS: She certainly earned it [retirement]. Susanne’s been working since she was like 16. So she deserves some happiness in retirement. 

SF: How do you envision your retirement, Joe? 

JS: I really have trouble foreseeing retirement. And how you let go of [work], what point you let go of it—it’s really hard to imagine. But the great side is, you know, we’ve had a very long time, and we’ve been able to do what we want to do in a place which is really nice to do it. So I think we’re way on the high end of good luck in that way, in life overall. 

A: And then, finally, I’ve been asking everyone something they admire about the other.

JS: Susanne’s brilliant, she’s compassionate, she’s incredibly courageous. She goes out of her way to help other people all the time, and she’s extremely sympathetic. She’s incredibly smart, she’s empathetic. To me, [it’s] a miracle she ever existed. Whenever she existed in proximity to me, that was amazing.

SF: Joe has all those same qualities. He’s the kindest person I’ve ever met. The smartest and the best teacher. Just totally devoted to his profession and to his students. And I really, really admire him, and he’s incredibly supportive. 

JS: She just got me cough drops from New Zealand. How’s that for support?

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Arya Dansinghani can be reached at adansinghani@wesleyan.edu.

Nancy Li can be reached at nli02@wesleyan.edu.

Thomas Lyons can be reached at tlyons@wesleyan.edu.

Lyah Muktavaram can be reached at lmuktavaram@wesleyan.edu.

Janhavi Munde can be reached at jmunde@wesleyan.edu.