D.O.S. (Disintegrating on Schedule)

I don’t recall the picture, only that it starred an actor who was young and handsome at the start of his career fifty years ago but was now an aged relic. Dark thoughts in the darkened theater as I watched the folds of wizened skin beneath  the famous chiseled jaw, pouches beneath the steel-gray eyes.  Projected on the screen at fifty times life size, .

He’d been a hero once but had changed into the old man in front of millions.

On the drive home, I keep glancing at my own eyes in the mirror. My private degradation, just as certain.

 

Friday Fictioneers

26 comments

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    • J Hardy Carroll

      Oh, I don’t know. “He’d been a hero once but had changed into the old man in front of millions” is a narrative. A hundred words can do a lot or a little. This one doesn’t do much, I guess. Glad you liked it, though ;-)

  1. rochellewisoff

    Dear Josh,

    As those shriveled heroes who were young and vibrant during my childhood die of natural causes, I look in my own mirror. You’ve captured the unspoken fears we all face I think. So well done.

    Shalom,

    Rochelle

    • J Hardy Carroll

      I just saw Blade Runner last night. I did note that while Harrison Ford is allowed to age, Sean Young was presented as her 22-year-old self. As the Weinstein allegations show, nothing has changed in Hollywood since the days of Harry Cohn.

      • Iain Kelly

        I’m going to defend Blade Runner, partly because I loved it – the Sean Young character was killed in the original, in this film it is a new replicant that we see, so she wouldn’t have aged. Harrison’s character has continued to live so would have aged whether human or replicant ( I assume). So the internal story logic justifies this. Your wider pint about Hollywood in general is of course, completely correct.

  2. k rawson

    I find myself intensely attracted to the narrator. Like I’d stay with him until death do us part, and always find him handsome… Unless he spoils Blade Runner for me. That would upset me.

  3. draliman

    I often wonder what actors think when they see themselves in films from long ago. At least, having grown up in the pre-digital era, very few photos of my younger self exist!

  4. Sheena

    Is that actually a picture of young you on the link? I like that you did that.
    Lets not think of it as degradation, we’ll call it metamorphosis ;-)

  5. rachelmalik99

    Hi there, I like this though it is grim, particularly the comparison between the big screen and the car mirror.

Don't just stand there.