I already have plenty of signs that I’m getting old.  Laugh lines cut across my face like tiny ravines.  What’s up with that?  As it happens, I have laughed a lot in my life.  I find many things funny.  And my reward is to have my face become a kind of chronological roadmap?  Legend: “One saggy inch = five years.”

Then there’s the love handles.  Ever since I sailed past the big 3 plus 0, it’s like someone poured too flesh into my legs and it began spilling over my hips.  Again, though, is “love handles” the correct term?  A loved one is not likely to say: “You appear to be tired. Let me pick you up by your conveniently placed handles and carry you the rest of the way.” Nor is a loved one likely to grab on to them in some sort of throes-of-passion thing; no one dares to put their hands into those undulating pits of quickflesh.  That’s a good way to irrevocably lose valuable jewelry.

Then there’s this weekend.  During a friend’s birthday celebration that lasted from 11 a.m.-2 a.m., I found a video game that I’m actually good at: virtual boxing.  I ducked and swung and defeated my opponent.  Three times. Until I got tired.  Winded.  My shirt soaked with sweat, I suffered a fatal TKO. I was finally beaten.  ("You burned 400 calories,” the game told me helpfully, as if the kids who play this thing use it to set aerobic benchmarks for themselves.)

But this wasn’t a real fight.  I wasn’t hitting anybody. I was beaten by my own physical exertion. I was beaten by air.

I knew I didn’t have any street cred. But it’s one thing to get beat up by the Bloods or Crips; it’s another to be the losing end of a throwdown by oxygen.

That could lead to the worst hip hop lyrics ever:  Don’t be surprisin’ if I start ionizin’/My molecules may be without color and taste/But I’m still all up in your face.

Getting old is just like that boxing video game.  No matter how many TKOs you deal out, you know that the game will eventually wear you down.  The blows will come fast and hard--taking out a clump of hair here, sticking in some flab there--and eventually your flesh begins to shake itself loose and sag from the unrelenting violence. You can try to reclaim the time that’s being snatched from you--make a party go from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m., drink shots in the afternoon, seek refuge in music and sex.  Refuse to ever go to sleep as a way of spinning out the precious moments.  But there’s still a final sucker punch waiting with your name on it. There’s no way you can beat the game; the only thing you can do is stay in the ring as long as you can, and put up a decent fight.