Movie Quote Stuck in My Head: ‘The Bourne Legacy’

Published October 25, 2023

Another quick one, which I have decided is better than nothing. It’s from the first movie I saw here in this city. I was looking at places to rent and decided to see “The Bourne Legacy.” In a twist I couldn’t have imagined, I now live next door to the cinema where I saw it.

Aaron Cross, on the run with Dr. Marta Shearing, who has assisted in giving him the physical and mental enhancements necessary for his top-secret work for the CIA, asks her if she’s ever seen a cognitive degrade. “Sensory withdrawal? You ever do that? Pull someone’s blues and watch them drop off their meds?”

No, she had not.

He asked “because they paint a pretty graphic picture in training.”

His recruiter had fudged to get him onboard. His IQ had been 12 points below the minimum, and the recruiter, needing to make his quota, added the points. The meds did the rest, giving Cross extraordinary capabilities.

But now cut off from his supply, he was in danger of not only losing his enhancements but also his life. The race was on to lock in his enhancements, something only she knew how to do and would be willing to do for him. Without that, it would be as if someone yanked the earth out from under him.

Hell of a long way to fall.”

I think about that quote a lot since starting hormone replacement therapy five years ago. It’s the reason I am still alive after all those years on the run from myself. I think about it a lot more often now that right-wing politicians are fundraising and running on promises to make gender-affirming health care not only illegal for young people but for people of all ages. Laws have already been passed toward that end.

This, of course, would include me.

“Hell of a long way to fall.”

It would be the end of my life as I know it. The end of my life as I want to live it for whatever time I have left. The end of my life in every sense, probably.

This is what’s at stake in every election for the foreseeable future. Please think of me and people like me. Other than vocal opposition to us and fierce hatred of us, we hear mostly silence. Likes and hearts on social media don’t move the needle against these campaigns. We need you to speak up and speak out.

Illustration of a brain and butterfly by Lightspring via Shutterstock.
“Movie Quote Stuck in My Head” is self-explanatory, but it’s more than that. It’s a chance to dig inside an old quote for new meaning, or a new quote for an old truth, or to chew on a line for fun or sustenance. It’s also inspired by and a tribute to “Real Time Song Stuck in My Head,” a popular feature on the Twitter feed of the late Craig Stanke, a former editor for CBSSports.com and, for too short a time, a leader by example to me during my time working there. You can read about him here.