Monday, February 15, 2010

Thanks Sterling

As many of you may know, I work at RC Willey Home Furnishings. And lets be honest, if you are reading this blog you probably know that very well (all 2 of you: thanks Allie and Mom!). I work with a man named Sterling. You could say Sterling is the store handyman/janitor. He is a mentally challenged individual that is about 45 years old but operates on a much more juvenile level. Sterling can often be found changing light bulbs or dusting tables and chairs around the store. An avid Utah Jazz fan, Sterling is always the first one in the morning to strike up a conversation about the assist total of D-Will and the coaching tactics of Sloan. Until recently, that is all I knew about Sterling. Last week, while I waited for a customer to get off the phone to proceed with the washer and dryer sell I was gunning for, sterling got off the adjacent ladder to talk. The topic of conversation led from the usual suspects of Jazz and BYU Basketball, to rarely touched subjects such as home life and missions. I came to find out that Sterling, a canadian native, served a mission in his homeland about 20 years ago. As the conversation moved to his family, I learned that his father passed away just two years ago. It was the next thought from Sterling that inspired this blog. He said, "I just need to keep the commandments so that I can see my dad again. Its pretty simple. All you need to do is keep the commandments and God blesses you. It is easy, not always easy to keep them, but the way is easy." I suddenly wasn't thinking about the Maytag 3000 series front-loaders. Instead I was thanking God for sending a very special man to remind me of a very important truth. Most people never grasp what I heard that morning. Sterling does. Thanks to Sterling I remembered it once again.