I’m sure I’m dying. Seriously, this has got to be it.

You know how it is when your body starts behaving differently?

Some people can feel a migraine coming on. Allegedly.

Others can tell when it’s going to rain because a knee or elbow starts aching.

People can sense seasonal allergies approaching – although, I think that one is more psychosomatic. Obviously.

I’ve got an itchy digit that tells me – with alarmingly weak accuracy – when I’m about to win. Maybe it’s just telling me I need a video lottery dopamine hit. Hmm.

That one kid can see dead people.

Of which I am convinced I soon will surely one be.

Hear me out.

Now that I’m getting around to making my point, I’m thinking I blew that “itchy digit” wad too early. <gasp!> Foreshadowing.

Let’s file this under the 21st digit, shall we? 10 fingers, 10 toes and for ~51% of the population, end of list. But that other 49% will understand where I’m going.

And I mean really understand.

But for the last couple of weeks- three, maybe – I’ve been coming to waking up…more alert than usual. That’s a scenario I hadn’t faced with any regularity since my mid-30s. Certainly not one I ever expected to return.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy my mornings at DEFCON 5. I wake up and casually read the news before starting my day.

Back in my 20s I felt like I woke up on the wrong side of DEFCON 2 most days. There was no casual reading those days. It was take care of it or hunker down and endure it.

Walking around the house, I’d feel like a submarine stood on end with a periscope stuck in its up position. Thank gawd the Internet was not then what it is now, otherwise you’d be able to Google my suffering.

But don’t let that diminish your schadenfreude. Just remember: I’m obviously about to die, ok?

I was never a prisoner of my libido. Not really. Situationally, I’ll experience a-ha moments when I have to admit that “it’s been a while”. Nothing like female friends of mine, mind you, who talk about their sex lives in a manner that prompts a mental Star Wars beginning credits scroll.

Those poor dears. But since most of my female friends lack my level of nerdiness, I feel like this is more apt…

Conversely, my male friends, well, I’m one of the younger fellas in that group. I have it on good authority that they probably think of me like I think of my female friends. Interesting how things like that balance themselves out, innit?

Anyway, with this sudden re-emergence of whatever faux virility this is also comes an urgency. Not the useful urgency of a bladder suffering from a good night of uninterrupted sleep. Useful because that morning walk to the bathroom might have been awkward when I lived with others, but a good whiz relieved two morning issues back then.

At least for me.

Now, though…my body is not having any two-fers. At least not for that situation.

Which has me thinking. Reminiscing, really, as my body mentally pokes me and whispers “Hey. Hey!” annoyingly. I’m recalling instances where I’d be sick in bed for a few days and was so miserable I just wanted to die. My body on the other hand was suddenly joined at DEFCON 2 by a useless ally: my libido.

I chalked it up to being bored.

Now I’m reconsidering that phenomenon as my body making its biological Hail Mary play to survive by, well…y’know. If I was mentally praying for death to end the suffering of my flu or cold or, let’s be realistic here, hangover, maybe my body was making sure my biological line would not end with me?

Boy, was it barking up the wrong tree if that were the reality! I mean, talk about a fool’s errand.

The last few weeks, though? I’ve definitely come to understand how there are so many stories or tropes about old men dying on top of young women. Not to make this a heterosexual male phenomenon, but I really can’t think of a time where I’ve heard of an older gay man dying on top of a younger partner.

I mean, Elton John, Stephen Fry and Dustin Lance Black are apparently lining up in the battle for equality there with their younger partners and spouses, so stand by?

But maybe it will be me, caving to the biological imperative only to find out – not to go back to the Star Wars well, but

Not that I have any options or candidates since kicking PanMan back toward the rock he crawled out from under. Maybe I’ll survive simply because the Reaper lacked an appropriate vessel Lost Boy to act through. Trust me, I know how he’d feel.

But that’s my story. I don’t see how anyone could possibly see it any other way. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go get my <ahem> affairs in order.