Lovey Thurston Howell III

A dear friend, who for her own protection I will henceforth refer to as "Lovey Thurston Howell III", and I had dinner last night. She is completely wild but totally responsible. I adore her and trust her deeply.

Lovey was the name of the coddled millionaire's wife on Gilligan's Island, and Thurston of course was the millionaire, but we’ve worked out that MY Lovey Thurston Howell III is entitled to both names because she clearly has enough personality for at LEAST two people. (I think several more, actually.) It’s also fitting that she gets a man’s AND a woman’s name because one of her primo personal specialties is raucous gender-bending. I can’t keep up with her in that regard very easily, but then, few could, (and really there’s no need to).

Sometimes when we’re joking around, (which frequently involves using silly voices and invented characters), both Lovey and Thurston emerge and make me laugh so hard my stomach hurts.

The Thurston side can be imperious and narrow-minded, the Lovey side can be self-indulgent and oblivious – and although this may make my Lovey Thurston Howell III sound repellant, it makes her exactly the opposite because she reminds me how important it is to acknowledge and satirize the universal human capacity for these things. (Even the Dalai Lama knows he COULD be self-absorbed if he gave into it.)

What started out as a fairly adult-flavoured evening (and by that I mean calm and "mature"), by the time I parted company with Lovey Thurston, I was so hyper from eating, laughing, and our wild-eyed antics that it took me two hours to settle down before bed.