How to do the wrong thing right
Ah, summer (toys and boys) when they sizzle! With July heat on the way, temperatures of my overheated dear readers’ panting libidos will also merciless rise with the mercury. Howard’s most-oft received scorcher questions burn a hole in my mailbox this time of year —they come, in fact, in three frostily iced flavors: 1. How do I stealthily harm my cheating asshole of a spouse? 2. How do I sobbingly wound my disobedient asshole boy-toy? 3. How do I successfully destroy you, Asshole Howard, with confounding questions? (This third one actually arrives irrespective of the season.)
Dear Howard,
My husband says we either need couples’ therapy to “rekindle our burnt-out passions,” or else risk becoming yet another failed gay marriage statistic with the word “doomed” all but tattooed on our foreheads. Hypothetically, we’re still monogamous, but of course after six-plus years together, I’d instead label our relationship as something more like “monogam-ish.” I travel a lot, so we’re at that Seven-Year-Itch stage where it’s basically, “Ask me no questions, I’ll tell you no lies.” Neal’s strictly a bottom; I’m totally a top — correction, I’m obligated to top when performing my conjugal duties with him. Here’s my question: Whenever I’m out of town for work, should I insist Neal be 100 percent faithful to me, even though I’m not with him? He’s poz, but he doesn’t know I am. — D.J. Lenny
Dear Jenny Lind,
Oh, fuck me (sigh!). OK, are you asking me if I sanction you playing fast-and-loose with your marriage vows — as a bottom groupie ’ho on the down-low — seeing as how Neal’s status won’t change until you return home again to Pleasant Valley Sundays in the ’burbs? Cardinal Howard naturally passes no moral judgment (hence, my column’s tagline: “How to do the wrong thing right”); nonetheless, to insist Neal stay faithful to you, while you’re chasing loads on the road, doesn’t exactly peal with the promise of celebratory, double-digit anniversary bells ever ringing for either of you. Personally, Jen, I think you should insist your partner (of these past six-and-three-quarters’ years) be every bit as faithful to you as you are to him… whatever mutually agreed upon level of honest, upfront, shared “monogam-ish-ness” that entails.
Dear Howard,
An ex-Army bud of mine down in Galveston and me (we’re both married, longtime, to women) keep private boy/toys on the sly. His own beauty sports just the most beautiful, wavy, shoulder-length blond hair … or he did until yesterday. Seems this poor kid made the unforgivable sin of getting it trimmed a friggin’ half-inch without first asking Daddy for permission; naturally, the impertinent little bastard immediately got marched straight back to the salon and ordered to get his entire head shaved, cue-ball bald! If that wasn’t punishment enough, the kid’s electronics given to him by my friend were all confiscated. I tried to talk reason with “Percy:” “Aren’t you being a little too strict on your boy? Hell, he was only trying to make himself look nice for you — come on, man, it was a friggin’ hair trim, it’s not like you caught him suckin’ off one of your wife’s secret boyfriends!” Howard, just how do I delicately inform my bud that this punishment he’s dealt his boy doesn’t in any way fit the kid’s alleged crime—especially since he didn’t even commit a “crime” in the first place? — Kash
Dear Kash,
This thoroughly humiliated young man’s formerly golden surfer locks will require six months minimum to grow back, so screw treating your ex-Army “fuck buddy” with kid gloves! Here’s what you’re to verbatim inform this shitwad sadist whom, I’ve no doubt, is uglier than even a sink full of his wife’s boyfriend’s used dildos: “Percy, you high-ballin’, low-trash hillbilly! Your kid was only making an effort to look more beautiful for you, not against you! There isn’t a boy on this Earth your limited resources can purchase, you petty, dunderhead, that kindness shown to him can’t poach away: Empathy gets anything; whereas money will only get you some things, and when ugly narcissists mishandle lovely things they don’t deserve, they always end up only losing them. Ultimately, Percy, I wouldn’t fret too very much about teaching your boy a lesson, as he’ll not be hanging around any such stupidly shallow a sociopathic fiend fool as you long enough anyhow, to harbor even one sweet memory of you at all.”
Dear Howard,
I follow your column feverishly, but you never answer sports questions, and I’ve sent you a lot: It’s high-summertime, Gayward—peak baseball season! Gays worship The Rangers same as breeders: What’s your lame-sissy deal? — Toby
Dear T’baccy Spit,
Here I stand, too, cocked bat in my hands — ready to knock a homer out of the fuckin’ park for you any curve-ball sports question you wanna fever-pitch Gayward’s way, and you can’t even pull those ben-wa balls out of your butthole long enough to hurl something/anything filthily meatier than just this lame, sissy-toss for me to punt?
— Howard Lewis Russell
Do you have a question — about etiquette, love, life or work — that needs a special spin from Howard? Send your problem to AskHoward@DallasVoice.com and he may answer it.
This article appeared in the Dallas Voice print edition June 30, 2017.