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Some signs of aging are very obvious and very expected. Knees that ache. Hair that disappears. Names that you can’t quite recall. Pounds that you can’t wish or walk away.

But what in the world are we oldies going to do about the latest in retailing?

Cash not accepted.

I smacked face first into this utterly 21st-century trend the other day when I popped into a local coffee place for my third cup of the day.

I have made an uneasy peace with the damage that baristas have done to our language. No longer can I get my customary “small cup of black coffee.” Oh, no. Their smallest cup is called “tall.” I have given up trying to understand.

And I have gotten more and more annoyed by the cultishness that now surrounds my simple, well-rehearsed request.

I don’t care whether the coffee beans were grown in Chile or Kenya. I don’t care if the barista leaves room for cream. I don’t want my coffee fancified into a latte or a cappuccino.

I. Just. Want. A. Small. Cup. Of. Black. Coffee. Please.

But these struggles pale in the face of what I encountered in my search for Cup Three. As I held a five-dollar bill out to the barista, she acted as if I’d flashed some sort of rabid rodent instead.

“Oh, no, sir, we don’t accept cash,” she said.

“Really?” I asked.

“Really,” she said.

“And what if I don’t have a credit card?”

“Then, sir, I won’t be able to help you.”

“And how about the language right here on this five-dollar bill? Legal tender for all debts, public and private?”

“I’m sorry, sir.”

I fished out a credit card with a sigh, and was soon sipping to my gullet’s content. But I kept returning mentally to that ever-so-old saw. The one about how the customer is always right.

Has that, too, gone the way of the Edsel and “American Bandstand?”

I asked to see the manager. He bounded brightly up to my table. I explained what had happened. He apologized (nice), and proceeded to make excuses (less nice).

Cash is hard to handle, he said. Baristas often make mistakes when giving change. And some baristas “skim.” That’s a 21st- century word for “steal.”

There’s also the risk of holdups, the manager said. But not at this store. If a robber enters this place, the first thing he or she will see is a sign that says NO CASH ON PREMISES. If similar signs work on buses and delivery trucks — and they do — why not at a coffee place?

I was ready with my counter-arguments.

“Don’t you realize that baristas can skim credit cards, too?” The manager said he did know that. But it happens very rarely, he told me.

“Don’t you realize that repeat business is the name of the game, and you’ve just run the risk of my never coming back here?” The manager said he sincerely hoped I’d be back, but he couldn’t bend or break the policy.

“And don’t you realize that accepting cash is better for your bottom line? It goes right into your bank account at the end of each day. Credit card sales don’t get posted for at least two days.”

The manager replied, lamely, that this was just one of the costs of doing business. Of course, he didn’t mention that the cost got passed on to me and every other coffee addict.

I would never try to blur the danger of robberies or internal thefts.

And I’m sorry if I was (choose at least one) rude, annoying or high-handed to that barista. She didn’t create the policy. She was only doing what she was told.

But, gosh, I so clearly remember saving my allowance when I was 8 years old so I could buy a candy bar for a dime. And raiding my piggy bank for enough change to buy a pack of baseball cards. And treating my little brother to an ice cream with a shiny quarter when he wasn’t being obnoxious (very rare).

There was no such thing as a credit card in those days, much less some fancy machine that swiped it. And the world spun on its axis just fine.

I think I must be getting old.

Or I need another coffee.

Or both.

Bob Levey is a national award-winning columnist.