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Correspondence from Karl Germer to Phyllis Seckler
[Undated: circa May 1956]
You see, I also have Aleister [Aleister Ataturk] at heart. He needs education and mental training. He can hardly read or write properly, stumbles over the simplest English words. He was at this costly & best school in Scotland but it did not help him any except give him high morals and, shall I say, magical training. He was born in Scotland. At the age of 3 or so, his mother took him to Switzerland for a brief span, then to Jerusalem, thence to Egypt where he learned to live and speak Arabic; that was during the war. At the end of the war back to England; he was very sick for years (pneumonia, mastoiditis and other things); he lost elementary school in the vital years and never caught up with reading, spelling, vocabulary, etc. It is just tragic. In certain things he is old above his age; when it comes to reading or writing and particularly spelling, geography, history, etc. he is like a savage.
My dream has been that living with your bright kids, his vanity, ambition and your school-book facilities would enable him to catch up, force him to concentrate (of which he has plenty) on improvement and get a challenge. If he would and could take a job, no matter at what, add to the treasury, live in your house, he might pick up in 6 months what he has lost in 6 years.
He is a fine boy, somewhat spoiled, independent, stubborn, but responds to a firm hand. He is handsome, probably a danger to girls some day, 6'1", with a willowy figure and has plenty of charm.
He needs discipline as he is somewhat disorderly and careless, but has a very generous heart. He is not baptized, as his mother is a true Thelemite, and he knows his True Will is in the field of Thelema.
For the above stated reasons I incline to having him live with or near you and give you and your kids the job of making a mentally civilized human being out of him. Financially, he will never be a burden on you and in many things a great help.
He drives well; I have seen to that, and when we leave from here, at least 2000 miles of driving will have to be done by him; having the soul of an artist and Neptune in the first house, he is liable to be dreamy at times unless his mind is concentrated on a definite job.
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