* 13 April 1981 Monday 11.30pm

My spirit feels very uneasy and it is weak. My talent, for what it’s worth in these depraved days, can offer me nothing; nothing will come. I search for song titles in the writings of others.

I feel livelier now, stronger. I’ve been drinking though – as always.

I must find some new companions. The friends I keep now crept into my life during the days of Christine, and some of them may have avoided the security check.

Over the taxi-driver’s radio: … Wellington Street. Like a hot knife. She can stab me through a fly speck on the wall. Through a newspaper crushed in the gutter

The Ears at the Exford Hotel [?] circa 1980

*

Christine’s flat was in Wellington St, that was the significance.

For many months, the slightest thing – a word, a warm breeze, a song – could set off the pain. Bryan Ferry’s version of John Lennon’s ‘Jealous Guy’ – that was the worst. When I hear it today, it still fills me with melancholia

Mick Lewis and Sam Sejavka [The Ears]

*

Back in the present, I’ve had an atrocious day. On my way to pick up Robert from South Melbourne, I drove into the back of a black car. Of course my Third Party had lapsed, and of course my Renault is on the critical list. I really don’t know how I’m going to cope with this financially. Tomorrow, maybe, I’ll be able to think more clearly.

These things can hit you out of the blue, can’t they? It was my fault, but the shoddy driving of the contactee was largely responsible. They were truly contemptible, by the way - this man and his distastefully subservient wife. My phone was out of charge and he refused to let me make a call on his, even when I offered money; the wife wouldn't let me because she hadn't got the say so from him. The guy, who looked like he might have been related to Pol Pot, spent a long time watching me trying to push the Renault out of traffic before he deigned to assist.

My faith in humanity was restored to a degree by a girl, who stopped beside me as I walked to Robert’s. Having seen the accident, she inquired after my well-being with some genuine concern.