*From home – 16th May 1998

Email with TLJ

T: look how fucked up everything is here when i dial up from home. how can I fix this>>>>>>>>>>>?/////????????????
pleas ee help with this dileea!!!!!!!!!
Good sleepy-pies to you, love and kisses, your fan Tracky-Dacks.

S: TLJ
This message looked fine when it got through to me – when did you send it?
I got my printer working – yeah!
Thank you for calling me late last night – I’m sorry I got tired real quick and had to go straight to bed after talking to you and now I’m up again at Eight am!! I smell of cigarettes and MUST have a shower today!!
Baby, you the best
Shaun

*Hell-o – 18th February 1998

Email with TLJ

S: TLJ
Hey, my dearest. Come see me and I’ll write you poems you’ll never forget. Come fall in the bliss. come watch my TV. come logon to my virtual console and welcome to the love-in.
Your hunny
Shaun

T: hun, how you going?????

what you up to babe – ee? i’m coming to see you – i hope, after kickboxing. but only if i can have a sleep, a cold beer out of your new fridge, and watch the footy on you new baby (the tv) and then some real crap like independence day on your new video player.

i’ve been trying to get josh to sit down and do sm with me all day, but he keeps fucking off and eating – after lectures and then after tute, so I’m fucking fed up – and i’m not waiting around for him later. i’m coming to see you! i just figured out that i can hand sm in on thursday anyway.

catch ya honey. hope you’re having a great day, Shaun went all the way, with tlj!!!!!!!!!

*Good losers – 15th February 1998

Email exchange with TLJ

T: i had fun yesterday despite losing cards – had plenty of fun playing cards with you – can we play again?
S: Sure but only if you behave like a GOOD LOSER!
T: anyway, hope you’re having a great day
S: Not bad – think positive…

T: I woke up really hungry this morning.
S: Yeah – me too – perhaps you shoulda eaten that stuff I gave you last night!!!
T: i’m just in early waiting for accounting
S: Conscientous young lady that you are.
T: i tried to read my accounting in bed last night but fell asleep, so i have to catch up.
S: Surprise surprise – wish I coulda bin in yr arms sweety
T: how are you this morning?
S: Back and neck still sore – can’t wait to lie down!
T: everyone treating you pleasantly?
S: Yeah I guess. I’m starting to like people these days (Jeez – what’s wrong with me!)
T: i’ll catch up with you later.
S: Yeah – I hope so.

T: i’m still really tired.
S: I’m not too bad considering all the late nights. Starting to get used to being constantly tired.
T: did you get the mail i forwarded from josh yesterday?
S: No, send it to me – what is it?
T: speak to you later.
S: Please do my dearest

T: i’ll be working on sm with josh today, but i don’t know where yet.
S: Good luck – hope you get it all done. You able to come out Sat night or not until Tues night? I may go watch Craig play soccer on Sun pm but if you can get out I’d rather go for a walk with you in Lane Cove Nat Park. Look forward to speaking with you naked lady. Love your skin, love your everything

T: yo, join the posse and…..the BIT experience with fiona G and …….the chapstick boys and other such ludicrous names for josh, marty and jeff’s (aka the bit boys) rap group.
S: What’s all this about???
T: anyway sweety, how’s your day been?
S: Pretty good though pretty tired too.
T: i was sooo tired before i just fell asleep on the couches on level four.
S: Wish you wuz cuddled up with me.
T: i left what i’d done for sm with josh, who’s going to work on it tonight.
S: Did you do much? Are you happy?
T: anyway, think i’ll go home now as i’m so tired and there’s nothing else for me to do.
what time will you get home? I’ll call you.

T: why no email from you today except the one you sent this morning.
S: didn’t I send you others – maybe not – bin busy Probably.
T: i’m really hot in here.
S: I’m hot now talking to you!!
T: speak to me later???????
S: Oh yes!

*You’ve changed your place in this world – 2nd February 1998

Email to TLJ

Well – it has been a little while since writing in here. We had a great time on Saturday looking at tattoos – I love doing stuff like that with you – hope we can do it more in the future. And on Sunday of course everything changed upside down (for which you must not blame yourself). I don’t know what is going to happen now. I am waiting for your call.

*Back and forth, between the good and the bad – 28th January 1998

Email to TLJ

My head is going crazy. I have a bad headache this morning. The thing I fear most is losing you. You are very special to me – I love everything we do and know we can work it out. I think about all the things we could do together and I want that more and more. I know people may be against us but I still think things can work. I wonder if you feel the same way though – if you have doubts about your lasting love and the c-word everyone else says you are afraid of – commitment. I don’t ask anything of you in that way – I know you are young and free and my love may choke you. I know you may not stay even after I may leave my wife. My decision on that part is not something I am taking lightly. There are many more factors involved than just those involving you and I. I really would like you to be around if my decision was to leave her – I would definitely need your help and love – I know you do not want to be involved in my decision and I understand that but you have to be involved in some part if that is what I decide. In reality, the decision does not involve you because I know you cannot give me any guarantees (remember I ask for none). It is between myself and her. Please please don’t leave me now. I want to share times with you at the beach, in the city, with your friends, with mine (if I still have any), at uni, with work and study, everywhere (but only when you want it!).

Dead thoughts
Ban the bomb
Or bring it on
I hope they drop one
On London
Time is running out
You’ve heard it before
About the threat
Of nuclear war
I hope they drop
A bomb on my head
It’ll be an advantage
Being dead

You came to see me this afternoon – man it was hot! I’m glad you got home OK afterwards – I hate watching you walk off into the distance! I was already missing you. I know I have said it before but you are the best! I had fun exploring today and hope we can go do it again next week – I really like to find my way around new places like that. I used to go explore my local suburb and find all the hidden paths next to houses and stuff like that – can be an advantage sometimes when you have to run away from the police or something! Sweet angel TLJ – you make my heart race and my head spin – all the poetry within me is for you. Hold me.

*Could I hold on, should I hold on to you – 27th January 1998

Email to TLJ

Honey. These past few days have been a terrible trial for me. All seems about to change. I feel a big wave coming towards me and I expect it to crash. I’m frustrated with having to hide you, to sneak out to call you, to plan carefully our movements and stories. I want to be able to call you and see you whenever we feel like it. Every day seems bleaker to me at home. I can’t stand to hear future plans knowing what I know, I can’t stand to touch or kiss – I’m sinking into a pit. You are there, I know you will hold my hand but how long will you stay around. I need to talk to you about this. I need to discuss my future. Baby, know that I love you deeply and want to have the right relationship with you that you so desire.

What’s going on?
Have you ever felt like you don’t know what’s going on?
Do people ever look at you like you’re doing something wrong?
Do people ever look at you and don’t like your face?
Have you ever felt really out of place?
Will some people not accept you for the things you do?
Will some people not understand ‘cos you are simply you?
Do you ever feel like crying ‘cos of what other people do?
If you’ve ever felt this way then I’m just like you

Paranoia? Persecuted? Listening to the jazz show now – things are getting better. I’m at work and will be able to talk to you soon – always cheers me up.

Swimming in a sea of content
No lifebelt here
No rescuers near
One by one dropping into the sea
A sea of perfect harmony
No crashing waves come to kill
No serpents to bid you ill
No need to save the fool
Cos I’m swimming in a swimming pool

Wish everything was this easy. Things didn’t go too well this morning – I understand everything you are saying. I know I’m a pain in the butt (no pun intended!) – I don’t want to lose you (not as a lover) – I know it’s hard to deal with and things may get scary. I need to know that you will stay with me – I don’t want anything else from you – have no expectations for anything else. So hard to write this all down, so hard to know what the future holds. “Could I hold on, should I hold on to you..”

*…do all the things that lovers do! – 23rd January 1998

Email to TLJ

Thank you very much for meeting me in the city yesterday. Your face is so beautiful I want to wake up next to it – kiss gently on the forehead and rise and make you breakfast while you slumber longer…we talked about fantasies..mine are no longer physical (ok I could think of some if you really wanted!) I want to be with you, baby.

I Feel
I feel rejected
I must be obsessed
Must be you
I want the best
I feel heartbroken
I must be annoyed
Must be you
I’m feeling paranoid
I feel in my head
I must be true
In my arms
I feel you

You’ll be in the mountains by now I guess. I wish you’d ring me – I want to talk with you for hours into the night, watch the moon rise and fall and do all the things that lovers do! Don’t want to go home tonight – I don’t like it there. I just found out I can’t go out tomorrow cos she doesn’t want me to – she thinks St Peters is a rough area (which it may be but who cares). Of course, I could say fuck it and go anyway and I know sooner or later it will come to that and one day I will go and I won’t come back. Jeez, I’m pissed off (maybe unfairly – but I can’t help the way I feel). Anyway, I’m thinking of you as always and wishing we were together (and wanting it more each day and the more I think about it the more it seems possible to me). Did you like the last poem?

It’s bigger than love – 22nd January 1998

Email to TLJ

Sweety. I’m gone. Lost. Don’t know what to say. I feel something really special between us – bigger than me. Lost in your love last night, never mind the s-word – the whole feeling of being with you.

Happen
At last it finally happened
It was too good to be true
I’ll never forget that moment
When I whispered ‘I love you’
And I had to stand back
To see the look on your face
And I was so relieved
That it wasn’t out of place

Well, interesting to read that one back. Not sure I had fallen in love at this stage or was just getting ideas off TV! It sure was hard to say goodbye to you this afternoon at Town Hall. I’m glad we have so much fun together even if sometimes we don’t have anything to say or just crap on about nothing. Everything feels so comfortable with you – like you say comfortable silences. Of course, we have a lot of deep stuff to talk about too and I know what you mean when you say you want to tell everything – that’s how I feel too. I am completely open to you – will tell you anything, everything etc etc blah blah. Crapping on now. My heart is with you – enjoy yr weekend in the mountains – I’m wishing I was there sweetheart.