the garage gospel: talent is its own expectation
Talent is its own expectation, Jim: you either live up to it or it waves a hankie, receding forever. Use it or lose it, he’d say over the newspaper.
Context
The talent-doctrine at its origin, the line 051's "talent is sort of a dark gift, that talent is its own expectation" will inherit almost verbatim: "Talent is its own expectation, Jim: you either live up to it or it waves a hankie, receding forever." The gift is a standing debt; the same "wave a hankie" figure that marked transcending the limit now marks talent's departure when you fail it. The father, who was "afraid to give my last talent the one shot it demanded," is the doctrine's failed exhibit, and he hands the curse down the line — talent as an expectation that owns you and abandons you the moment you flinch.