Letters

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MEDITATIONS ON A FREUDIAN THEME

Thank you for printing Cory's address (March, 1962) as given at ONE's Midwinter Institute. It is good to see such insight in pages too often given over to the type of expression set forth in Alison Hunter's Editorial in the same issue.

That was the opposite of a rational approach and a good illustration of what Cory is warning us about. She reveals the immature, individualistic viewpoint so common with homosexuals, but not peculiar to them alone, of course.

So many of us, myself included, are very prone to rationalize (a psychological device not to be confused with Cory's use of the word rational) our condition. We like to say we were born that way; God did it; or, our parents did it. Why can't we be honest and admit that we are emotionally and sexually immature? Because to change would be too painful. We prefer our way of life. Immature though it be, pleasant or painful though it be, it still meets some need, serves as a defense against something or somebody, past or present.

What we really need is a change in values and motivation, at least I do. For the past year I have had a very stable and pleasant relationship with another fellow. We have a beautiful apartment and enjoy living together but, as he remarked recently, "Sometimes I feel like we're a couple of fourteenyear olds at least we're just now doing what we didn't do at that age."

But, so what if it is kid stuff? We like it, that is, most of the time, until Cory and others come along and make us uncomfortable. i am convinced that we need to see maturity as a value, a highly desireable value, not because society says so but because it is intrinsically so in life. My problem lies in being motivated to want this value. How can we be so motivated? Any suggestions?

Mr. H. Dayton, Ohio

THE MIDWINTER INSTITUTE

Dear friends:

I've been wanting to tell you ever since I returned from the Midwinter Institute at the end of January how thoroughly I enjoyed meeting all the folks there. I was much impressed with the caliber of the people I met and the splendid work you are doing under great handicaps. Wish I could be of some real help and some day, no doubt, when I get my own problems solved I can.

At the Midwinter Banquet I felt one might easily have mistaken the meeting for a college seminar and it was better conducted than a lot of business conventions I've attended. You have made a lot of progress and are bound to make a lot more. There will always be "impossible problems" that will somehow get worked out with the guts, good humor and persistence you have demonstrated. Don't know when I've laughed so much as when with you good wits.

ON RAMP

Dear friends:

Mr. A.

Grossmont, California

Ramp's "Gentle Sir" (May, 1962) your best poem ever.

Dear ONE:

Mr. B.

New York, N. Y.

"Testament" is a deeply moving and beautiful work. Who wrote it?

Dear ONES:

Mr. B.

New London, Connecticut

The poem "Gentle Sir, and Testament" (I assume it's all one poem by the same man) is one of the most beautiful and best written I've seen in your Magazine.

Miss Sten Russell

Los Angeles, California