The only thing that truly counts for anything in this world, the one thing that can heal the heart and elevate the mind, is a good shag.

THE ABOVE PASSAGE, from an e-mail I recently sent to a friend, gave me a jolt. It was meant as a sort of joke, a smart-alecky retort to my friend’s oft-stated, grindingly responsible life plan: gotta get a good job, gotta get a nice place, gotta get my head straight before I go getting me a man, and so on ad queaseam. And yet as soon as I clicked the send button I felt a little frisson shoot from the base of my spine to the nape of my neck. At first I thought I’d simply sat on my Stella Artois bottle-opener key chain again, but this was something else. I was having a moment.

It was the word "shag" that threw me — passion given the Austin Powers treatment. On the face of it, of course, there’s nothing wrong with tee-heeing your way to sexual fulfillment. A meaningless bonk can be a real pick-me-up. And yet my chirpy, insouciant use of the S-word seemed groaningly off-key. You see, a few months back my wife left me. Packed up her stuff and drove to California. Took my Dexys Midnight Runners CD with her. Under these circumstances, a good shag could never be good enough. No way, as an odious workmate of mine used to say, no day.

But I’m fine. Really I am. Well, not really. This is how it goes: one minute you’re fine, the next you’re not, or at least you think you’re not, and then you’re not not fine, which is as good as feeling fine, or would be if you could feel anything. The only sure thing is this: if you’re a Recently Separated Guy (an RSG), single women are going to give you a wide berth. You will be alone. That’s just the way it is.

The RSG doesn’t know his own mind — which is just one of the things that make him the least attractive romantic prospect this side of John Wayne Bobbitt. RSGs are said to be needy, bitter, maudlin, muddled, calculating, fickle, cold, distracted, unreliable, sentimental, self-absorbed, and given to going on and on and on about Her. And we are, we are. Moreover, very often we haven’t laundered our socks in a while.

Above all, RSGs are desperately lonely. And desperation, as we all know, is an extremely potent anti-aphrodisiac. So what does the RSG do to mask his condition? He fixes himself up; he buys himself a new wardrobe; he subjects himself to a grueling process of systematic self-improvement. In other words, he hangs a big sign around his neck: desperate and lonely, please love me. This much I know.

In the past month, I have dyed my hair (blond), had an unsightly mole removed from my chin (ouch), spent hours sizzling in the sun (eek), and launched myself into an intensive get-fit-quick regimen. Actually, this isn’t entirely true. I’m not trying to get fit, I’m trying to get not-fat, which is, in many ways, getting fit’s opposite.

In order to get not-fat, for instance, I cannot quit cigarettes; in fact, I must increase my daily intake. Also, I must switch from my usual diet of flab-inducing beers to liver-drubbing hard liquors. Soon I’ll be swilling Old Crow with a twist of broccoli, sprinkling cocaine on my Total. But who cares? When you’re an RSG, how you feel is a lot less important than how you look. Give me death, but do not take away my abs.

But I digress.

Why did that throwaway "shag" line give me such a jolt? Well, because it smacks of truth, and because it contradicts an emotional maxim I have held dear ever since I became an RSG: what’s missing from my life right now, I’ve been telling myself, is love, not sex. But love isn’t missing from my life. I have a surplus of it, a backlog. I’m bursting at the seams with the bloody stuff.

For example (RSGs are spectacular over-analyzers, maestros of the vapid analogy): let’s say for the last five years you’ve run 10 miles a day, every day. One day you trip over a poodle and break your leg — hell, let’s make it both legs. Suddenly, you’re confined to a bed. You have all this energy and nothing to do with it. You go a bit crazy. This is what it’s like for the RSG. You have all this emotional energy and nothing to do with it. You’re crazy with it. You run around saying, "Here, you have it. Here, you have it."

A friend of mine keeps telling me I’m supposed to wait at least a year until I start dating again. I cannot say how many times I’ve heard the words "You need to be alone for a while." One person actually said, "You need to learn to love yourself." Well, I’ve been loving myself for the past three months now. I’ve learned enough.

So maybe all I need is a good shag. The problem is, as I sit and think about this — about the whos, about the wheres — I feel more barren than ever. And then I am visited by a memory from last summer: I’m on Cape Cod, alone, strolling across a marsh. In the distance I can see two birds — tall, pale, swish-thin — cranes, perhaps, or herons. It’s so quiet. The birds are so quiet, shimmering like ghosts in the sunshine. I’m alone, but I am happy. And with this thought comes the knowledge of what I need to do. I need to get my life together. I need to get my head straight. Above all, I need to have sex with a heron.

Chris Wright can be reached at cwright[a]phx.com