Celibate marriages are common enough that the French even coined a phrase for them: un mariage blanc. Of course, the French didn't anticipate that the partners in such an arrangement would actually do without sex, simply that they would do without sex with each other, whether because husband or wife or both had something going on the side that consumed all their attention and sexual energy, or perhaps because the marriage was a sham to satisfy immigration authorities. But when I proposed to Sharon that we enter into a "white marriage," I was talking the real thing.

We were already sleeping in separate bedrooms. I suppose some readers will leap on that as evidence that there was some dysfunction in the marriage already, and there was: my snoring. As a child I had had the awesome experience of listening to my own father's snores rumble through our household, like a convoy of 18-wheelers, and had determined -- as my own log-sawing genes kicked in -- that I wasn't about to subject anybody, much less someone I loved, to that. So I moved myself to my office downstairs, where there was just enough room for a single bed.

But now I was proposing to Sharon that our in-house trysts and occasional dirty weekends come to an end; if we were ever to share a bed again, it would be to watch "Law and Order." Sharon was circumspect; whether she felt a sense of defeat, or was suppressing a cry of "Yippeee!" I couldn't tell you to this day. But she agreed. I figured that if she decided she didn't like the idea, she would simply show up at my bedside some night, slip between the covers, and that would be that. I was even hopeful that she might. But that visit never came.

And so I began my adventures in abstinence. For about a week, I felt pretty sorry for myself: 'tis a far, far nobler thing I do, etc., etc. Then, the perks began to kick in. As Sharon's and my sex life had dwindled, I had been reduced to the status of a frantic little corgi looking to hump somebody's leg, constantly wondering whether tonight would be the night I'd get some -- Yes? No? Maybe tomorrow? Maybe if we double up on the K-Y? Maybe if we watch "Emmanuelle" first? Now I realized that for the first time in months, maybe years, I felt like a full-grown, adult male again. By taking fucking out of the marital equation altogether, I had regained some measure of control over my yapping libido, and recovered some dignity in the bargain.

My libido, of course, was not so easily convinced. It still wanted to know where the snatch was. Jacking off in my forlorn bed, like Lester Burnham auto-eroticizing in the shower at the beginning of "American Beauty," I was that most abject thing on earth: a masturbating middle-aged married man. But one of the dirty little secrets of celibacy is that, counterintuitively, the longer you go without intercourse, the less you care. Over time, I found that I'd rather read another chapter of whatever it was I was reading than get frisky with myself. I had my self-respect back, and I finally finished "A Man in Full."

No doubt some men, per the French formula, would have gone out and found themselves a mistress. I have spent much of my life wishing I was one of those sorts of men, but, alas, I'm not; I am essentially monogamous, and not at all the roué type. I suppose if a mistress candidate had presented herself, I might have acceded, but none did. (Perhaps essentially monogamous males give off some sort of scent.) And then there was the fact that, having been the one who initiated our sexual holiday, I could hardly tell Sharon, implicitly or otherwise, to be a good soldier while I partied it up on the side. I can't help being essentially monogamous, but I can help being a jerk.

And, the fact is, increasingly I couldn't be bothered. I was enjoying my new hobby, and so, to all appearances, was Sharon. I'm still not convinced that abstinence results in sudden stores of energy to be put to other, more exalted uses, as mystics and professional athletes sometimes testify. For the record, I don't feel any closer to God now, and I still haven't run the four-minute mile. But what celibacy does open up is vast tracts of time. Where once I might have lounged seductively on the living-room couch, hoping to be noticed, and then, if I got lucky, spent the next two or three hours in pre-, during, and post-coital occupation, I now found my nights tantalizingly, reliably, uninterruptedly free -- free to watch "CSI" with the 17-year-old who, now that his Sturm-und-Drang years were fading, I was just getting to know again; free to assemble the ingredients for the perfect beef fondue; free to, of all things, talk with my wife, leisurely, truly intimately, with no erotic agenda crackling in the background. For as much as celibacy has allowed me to feel like a grown-up again, it has also allowed me to see Sharon as one, with no sexual strings attached, perhaps for the first time in our relationship.

Maybe that's why she seems changed as well. Watching her the other night addressing a crowd at a school function, I was struck by what a cool, crisp, poised item she has become in her middle age, wryly cracking asides to the audience and reminding me a bit of one of those Westchester matriarchs who know a lot more than they ever let on. Maybe that's just me; maybe that's because I'm no longer viewing her through a hormone-addled haze. But I expect that the change is real; that she really is a happier, more self-assured woman than she was five years ago. Wouldn't you be, if you no longer had to face the regular prospect of having the best idea God ever dreamed up turn out to be a painful, utterly unrewarding ordeal?

Talking with Sharon as I wrote this article, we both agreed that we missed the intimacy -- the messy, juicy, skin-rouging intimacy -- of a sexual relationship; hugs only go so far. So it may be that our erotic interregnum is coming to an end. This will mean adding some new tricks to our bedroom repertoire -- admittedly, an area in which we've been slack -- though I very much doubt it will mean a single bedroom again. Sharon still likes to sleep.

Because intercourse remains a bad idea, we will remain, technically, celibate. I like that idea. In fact, it seems to me it places me in a vanguard. As more and more women swear off estrogen therapy, more and more of their partners may find themselves walking a solitary path. But don't worry, boys. It's not so bad. In fact, you may find yourselves growing up for the first time.

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