"Time -- he's waiting in the wings"

I liberated this illustration from the depths of the infinite forbidden zone known as the notional environment of cyberspace.  I would give credit to its creator if I knew the identity, but, since I do not, I simply will say, "thank you .... you do good work .... I like your work." It seems to represent to me a creature whose name is Memory trying to find its way back to its owner .... or whatever.

"Memories light the corners of my mind"

Rutger Hauer was a Dutch actor and an environmentalist (although I think the role of environmentalist is the more important of the two and should be noted first) who died in 2019 of undisclosed causes at the age of 75. His most well-known role, many would argue, was in the 1982 film, "Blade Runner," as the self-aware replicant Roy Batty.

"Blade Runner" was an adaptation of Philip K. Dick's 1968 science fiction novel, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" The film takes place in a dystopian future Los Angeles of 2019, in which synthetic humans known as replicants are bio-engineered by a powerful corporation to work at space colonies. When a fugitive group of advanced replicants led by Batty escapes back to Earth, burnt-out police officer Rick Deckard agrees to hunt them down.

Batty's body begins to fail as the end of his lifespan nears -- planned obsolescence, you understand. As the film draws toward its conclusion, he saves Deckard's life and, as he is dying, Batty delivers a masterful monologue about his memories:

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die."

The monologue had been composed by screenwriter David Peoples and altered by Hauer. An earlier version read: "I've known adventures, seen places you people will never see, I've been Offworld and back .... frontiers! I've stood on the back deck of a blinker bound for the Plutition Camps with sweat in my eyes watching stars fight on the shoulder of Orion .... I've felt wind in my hair, riding test boats off the black galaxies and seen an attack fleet burn like a match and disappear. I've seen it, felt it ...."

The original script, before Hauer's rewrite, was: "I've seen things .... seen things you little people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion bright as magnesium .... I rode on the back decks of a blinker and watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments .... they'll be gone."

Hauer said later that he "put a knife" to the final lines to cut the "opera talk" and to show Batty wanted to "make his mark on existence .... the replicant in the final scene, by dying, shows Deckard what a real man is made of ...."

How many of us think similar thoughts, I have no idea. In a self-centered way, I think about it frequently, of how my memories -- the recollection of my experiences -- will be lost when I die. At some point along the way, I began to understand it as one of the things we all have in common. Our memories, I assume, disappear into oblivion when we depart our lives on Earth. Our lives intermingle, but each and every one of us is an entity onto itself .... onto ourself.

I guess in a sense of finality, Hauer might be described as an editor with a sharp knife, an environmentalist who put his money where his mouth was and an actor who could bridge the distinction between a replicant and a very human being.

Watch the film and read the novel, if you are so inclined and have not already done so, and think about that final, brief soliloquy and your own memories.

Perhaps, it is for the best our memories fade into oblivion when our switch is flicked off .... but / but / but the simple thought of it is ever so annoying and frustrating ....