Now . . . well, hey . . . you know, uh . . . the aches and pains aren’t what he thought they might be at age 42 . . . the Bruins have flip-flopped a lackluster season into a Yasgur’s Farm lovefest . . . he is playing big minutes, first-line important, impactful, meaningful, gee-we-need-ya-out-there-Rex minutes . . . and suddenly that birth certificate from Kamloops, British Columbia, that reads Feb. 1, 1968, may be tattered at the edges but it’s not necessarily the self-imposed pink slip it was less than year ago.

“To be able to feel this good,’’ Recchi mused early yesterday afternoon at the Garden, less than 24 hours after he and his fellow Bruins gained a leg up on the Flyers with a 5-4 overtime win in Game 1 of their best-of-seven second-round playoff series, “maybe I still have more in the tank.’’

Maybe? Yeah, maybe like the Philadelphia mint still has pennies to punch out for the spending public. Let’s not have anyone here in the Hub of Hockey dialing up the AARP and tellin’ that bunch of buzzkills that the guy in the No. 28 sweater is at the top of the NHL seniority list, OK? Like Recchi himself, that just doesn’t have to go anywhere, right? Let’s just shutupaboutit. Good, glad we have an understanding.

Recchi inked his name onto the scoresheet Saturday with but one assist, getting the second helper when Steve Begin opened the scoring only 2:39 into the first. It was an eventful first couple of minutes, including the fact that the winger opposite Recchi, Marco Sturm, had his season end fewer than two minutes earlier when his right knee folded up, origami-like. The Bruins already were improvising lines faster than Robin Williams at a Rotary roast.

By the end of the afternoon, which came 13:52 into overtime, Ol’ Man Rex had logged 32 shifts, recorded 21:19 in ice time, hit goalie Brian Boucher with five shots, and posted a plus-2. Retire? What the heck do you mean, retire? The guy with 1,614 career points, including 3-3—6 this postseason, looks like he’s just getting his mojo going.

Recchi certainly showed that with 11:14 gone in the third period Saturday when he finally had enough of Chris Pronger’s act. Now, to Pronger’s credit, it’s a pretty good act. He is big, mean, and nasty, still bringing the evil along the blue line at age 35, which makes the 16-year veteran a relative babe in the woods to a guy like Recchi. But with Recchi near the left post, trying to increase Boston’s lead to 5-2, the overzealous 6-foot-6-inch Pronger tried to hand Recchi’s helmet to him. In fact, he worked over the 5-10 winger to the point that he lost both his helmet and his temper.

With play stopped, Recchi, his fists spread some 18 inches across the shaft of his stick, jumped straight at the towering Pronger and reached up to smack the carbon lumber across the big man’s chest. Both of them were tossed for cross-checking, Recchi picking up an extra deuce for roughing.

“We all know,’’ Boston coach Claude Julien noted yesterday, following his squad’s optional workout at the Garden, “Chris Pronger takes liberties sometimes.’’

And sometimes liberties have to be rescinded.

“That’s what Mark Recchi decided to do,’’ Julien said, his tone both flat and pointed, a subtle calling-out of Pronger’s way that could simmer beyond subtle when the squads play Game 2 of the series tonight at the Garden.

These are the little, delightful, nasty playoff subplots and battles that some of us in the audience still live for. Big guy takes a shot at little ol’ guy. Little ol’ guy, looking a whole lot like Yosemite Sam after some two-bit hambone just knocked off his cowboy hat, comes back nastier than a bucket full of chuckwagon chili. Delicious.

What a teachable moment for Julien, who, like all NHL coaches, wishes he could dress 20 Yosemite Sams every night and, you know, let the sweat ’n’ blood splatter where it may. Asked yesterday if he often uses Recchi as a role model for his younger players, Julien offered evenhanded praise for his veteran right winger and noted those Pronger “liberties’’ that had to be appropriately addressed.

Quietly, impressively, Recchi has become the steady, respected, admired voice in the Boston dressing room. He has the attention of a lot of kids, none of whom really knows, as he does firsthand, what it takes to finish off a season with a hoist of the Stanley Cup. He did that for the first time in 1991 as a 23-year-old in Pittsburgh when he connected for 34 points in 24 postseason games with Club Magnifique. He did it again in 2006 as a late-season hire-on with the Hurricanes, notching 16 more playoff points under the tutelage of coach Peter Laviolette, who now runs the Flyers bench.

Recchi knows what it takes, that navigating the grueling Cup road is a learning process, and he also is very aware that the kids in the Boston room are watching him, looking for his direction, his guidance, guile, and know-how.

“Yeah, I do get that they’re watching,’’ he said. “They’re good kids. I’ve been lucky to be around kids like this before, and it’s great. They’re watching how I practice and play, I know that, and it’s good.’’

That ‘A’ on Recchi’s shoulder is not for “aged’’, but for the grade of game he expects from himself and from others. For those in the room paying attention — and how could they not when he’s drilling two fists into Pronger’s expansive chest? — it’s a career lesson that plays out in shifts of gold.

Now he’s thinking seriously about extending his run. No matter that his wife might have a “to do’’ list from here to Chilliwack and back.

“Yeah, I’m sure she has some things,’’ he said with his wry smile, “but my kids still want me to play.’’

The kids with the Spoked-Bs on their chest want the same.

Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at dupont@globe.com.