Love Story in Residence - NYTimes.com LUCAS MATTHIESSEN was born in 1950s Paris, the son of a free-spirited couple who were "looking for Hemingway," as the title of a famous essay by Gay Talese described their generation of expatriates. His father is Peter Matthiessen, the writer, and his mother was Patsy Southgate, described in an obituary as the most beautiful woman in Paris during those years. Back in the United States before he was a year old, Lucas grew up in Greenwich Village and bounced from one boarding school to another before ending up at Columbia University. But when he was a sophomore, the world started disappearing, becoming fuzzier, then darker, then finally, by the time he was 40, invisible. Like so many people in his situation, he could not accept the idea. He drove a car until he was 26. Refusing to use even a white cane, he barreled around the streets of New York, riding the subway, bumping into people, living dangerously. "It was crazy, not to mention unsafe," Mr. Matthiessen, who is 59, said of those years. But I'd rationalize. I'd overcompensate. For years I was in total denial. Nor did his blindness, caused by a condition called retinitis pigmentosa, slow him down. Starting out as an intern at The Paris Review, a publication his father helped found, he worked for years in publishing. He married and divorced twice, along the way becoming the father of twin sons, now 23. Two decades ago, by then virtually unable to see, he moved to social work. Today he is a director of field operations for Catholic Charities Brooklyn and Queens, overseeing six behavioral health programs. In 2004, when Mr. Matthiessen was living in a tiny studio on Amity Street in Cobble Hill, he met a soft-spoken bassoonist named Claire de Brunner. Their first encounter sounds like something out of a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. "We met at a party," Ms. de Brunner said. I heard his voice across the room, and I fell in love with it. Mr. Matthiessen added, "Ours is very much a love story." Ms. de Brunner received her musical education at the North Carolina School of the Arts and Manhattan School of Music, and studied with the first bassoonists of the New York Philharmonic and the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. By day she works as a copy editor and proofreader for Siegel+Gale, a strategic branding firm. Nights and weekends are devoted to practice and performance. Though Ms. de Brunner is classically trained, her work is increasingly jazz-inflected, and she is a founding member of two bands, Church of Betty and 101 Crustaceans. Ms. de Brunner moved to Brooklyn Heights in 1979, shortly after graduating from college, and when she met Mr. Matthiessen, she was renting a one-bedroom in Cobble Hill. The pair lived there for two years, but it was a tight squeeze, partly because of the presence of Mr. Matthiessen's guide dog, a golden Lab-retriever mix. The dog was provided by the Guide Dog Foundation, and Isabella Rossellini, who trained him with her fellow actress Linda Larkin, had named him Goose, after the vodka. In 2010 the couple married. The following year, they paid $500,000 for a quirky two-bedroom apartment in an Art Deco building on Joralemon Street in Brooklyn Heights. They were introduced to the place by Phyllis Elliott, an energetic broker from Corcoran whose leopard suede boots Ms. de Brunner still remembers fondly. As a legacy of the structure's former life as an office building, the apartment is oddly shaped, not the ideal setting for someone who cannot see. "There's no such thing as a right angle," Mr. Matthiessen said. Every room is slightly crooked, which is part of the charm. But for a blind guy like me, it's hard. He has hit his head more times than he can remember. Yet for someone like Mr. Matthiessen, who is extremely sensitive to noise, a fourth-floor space on a quiet residential street is prized. In addition, he lives just steps from his office. And suddenly there is enough space. The smaller bedroom has been converted to a music room. In the evening, Ms. de Brunner sits in front of the music stand and practices, invariably with her cat, Gretel, curled up on the sofa. "From Day 1, she sat there," Ms. de Brunner said. I think she's listening. I can see her ears move. The subdued décor is enlivened by exposed brick walls, shimmering sea-green Italian tiles in the kitchen and gleaming cherry floors that remind Ms. de Brunner of the variety of maple woods - mountain, black, sugar, curly - that bassoons are usually made of. Shelves overflow with books and CD's. Jack Youngerman's abstract silk-screen for The Paris Review that dates from the years George Plimpton was the editor hangs opposite the fridge. Mr. Matthiessen still remembers its bold red, white and blue design. Another image for the magazine, a Paul Davis lithograph depicting a woman pushing back a cascade of lustrous brown hair, hangs over the couple's bed. In the bedroom, a computer sits on a small desk. Here Mr. Matthiessen is pounding away at a novel, a work be described as a love story of sorts. "When I first started losing my sight," he said, "I was in such denial that I never learned to type." But he eventually forced himself to master that skill, and now uses a program that makes audible the words on the screen. Sitting in an armchair facing a vista of treetops and brownstone roofs, Mr. Matthiessen traced the course of his condition through what he has been able to see over the years. "When they were very young, I could see my children," he said. Twenty years ago, he could still see some shapes and colors; he remembers a fleeting image of a child in front of a fountain. As recently as a few years ago, he remembers seeing a flash of green when fireworks exploded outside his window. His succession of guide dogs - Goose is his third - are threaded through that history. "I remember getting my first dog, in 1996," Mr. Matthiessen said. I remember sprinting down the street, literally yelling with joy. Mr. Matthiessen is extremely independent. He rides horses. He climbs mountains. He travels. Shells from vacations in Mexico line the windowsill. Still, there are limits. "I'd love to know what my wife looks like," he said. But the reality is that I can't. Ms. de Brunner views their relationship in a different way. "In a way, Luke sees me better than most people do," she said. Maybe he sees me through my music. E-mail: habitats@nytimes.com