Remember Dr. Ruth?

Back in the 1980s, this tiny woman with a thick German accent broke new ground, first in radio and then in television programming, giving candid sex advice. My most vivid memory . . . well, my most vivid memory is hearing her read a viewer’s letter and exclaim, “Tree people? What’s all this about sex with tree people?” After my wild mental image of human limbs and leafy branches intertwining in carnal-sylvan bliss, trunks and torsos heaving, hair and foliage tossing, finally subsided, I realized Dr. Ruth was responding to a question about a ménage à trois. For younger readers, that’s what we used to call threesomes (or treesomes, if you have a thick German accent) back in the day when it wasn’t practically a rite of passage. Now you can flip on MTV’s “The Real World” and watch random trios of drunken young people fall into bed together without a second thought, groping and giggling. But in days of yore, when hair was big and frizzy, and acid-washed jeans and legwarmers seemed like a good idea, the threesome still held an air of mystery and was spoken of in hushed French whispers.

Anyway, I digress.

My second most vivid memory is of reading a review of Dr. Ruth’s television show, which marveled over one simple fact: This little old lady (okay, she was just pushing sixty, but that was old to me at the time) with the funny accent was doing something radical. She was talking about sex as  …