Preliminaries

I didn't think I was ready to fight yet. I mean I didn't think I was prepared to be confined by rope in 400 square foot area with someone who deliberately wanted to injure me. True, I had worked my way into pretty good condition and true, I had learned how to punch a punching bag. But the thing is, punching bags don't punch back. I didn't know the first thing about defense.

"What's to know?" asked Danny (my trainer). "Defense is pure instinct. You'll know what to do when the time comes. And besides," he continued, "no one ever feels like they're (sic) ready for their (sic) first fight."

Well, that inspired a lot of self-confidence and so I gave Danny the green light to go ahead and arrange a sparring match. Danny was intent on finding a "suitable" opponent. I had never given much thought to the meaning of "suitable" until then. It's really a pretty relativistic term. Like someone that *I* think is suitable may not be suitable in the opinion of Danny. By "suitable," Danny meant someone my age. That was not what *I* thought of as suitable. Someone my age was bound to have about 40 more years' experience in the ring than I had. And that didn't suit me, I argued.

I thought a fair opponent would be someone with no fighting experience, a little pudgy and with a neck bigger than his biceps. Someone, perhaps, with less formal education than I had. Ideally, someone who had actually experienced deferred gratification. I was not thinking in terms of someone with the unlikely name of Percy Percy. And yet, that's exactly whom Danny selected for my debut.

As with all boxers who have been in the game more than 5 minutes, Percy had a nickname: "The Purse." I was going to fight Percy "The Purse" Percy. (My nickname, I'm disappointed to tell you, is "The Professor." Bobby "The Professor" Lewand. I abbreviate it to "The Pro.")

Mr. Percy, age 46, had 14 fights under his belt. He won his debut match but then hit a bump in his professional road and lost his next 13. Danny figured the guy is vulnerable; I'm thinking the guy is hungry. So the sparring match was arranged for 7:30 PM on September 13 - three 2-minute rounds at the Brooklyn Boxing Club.

I arrived at the club at 7:00, already dressed. (BBC has no locker facilities, no shower, no air-conditioning, "no nothing" in the words of Danny's partner, Irish Josh Hall.) I got there 30 minutes early because it was my intention to get taped and then to stare at The Purse menacingly for half an hour in hopes of intimidating him. But you know what they say about best-laid plans. Turns out The Purse didn't get there until 7:55. (So technically, I won this fight 10 minutes before he even showed up. I was 1 and 0.) But Danny said I should fight anyway.

The reason The Purse was late was because as he was leaving work he was detained by two police officers who wanted to ask him some questions about one of his clients. Percy works at Bill Burleigh's Bail and Bonds. (He was wearing a tee-shirt that read: "Get out early - Call Bill Burleigh.") I told him I thought Bill Burleigh's Bail and Bonds was alliterative." I seemed to annoy him. Which was the last thing I wanted to do. I just wanted to introduce some levity into what otherwise was starting to look like a pretty grim encounter.

The Purse weighed in at 214. Me at 190. This made me a "Cruiserweight" and Percy a "Heavyweight." So technically I won this fight by forfeit since he was fighting out of his weight class. Not all of Percy's 214 pounds were muscle. He did have a bit of a flabby mid-section that characterized my ideal opponent, and so I recognized that he was not invulnerable. Then I remembered my *own* mid-section and lost whatever psychological advantage I had momentarily maintained.

The time had arrived.