Lesson Learned

Tonight I was caught off guard. I went to institute to with Whitney and President Barry was teaching, so we knew we were in for a great lesson, which we definitely got. The greater lesson, however, came for us on our way out the door.

There is a guy that comes to our ward activities named Earl. He has been coming to them for the past year, and we never really know what his situation is to be honest. Earl is different from you and I. He has some sort of learning/social disabilities. I am not exactly sure what. I do know that he is always happy as can be and loves to give everyone hugs. He also loves to "chat," as he calls it. He will pull you aside and keep your attention for quite some time. I will be honest, I probably have had some instances where we were on our way out of ward prayer and I wasn't dying to stop and chat it up with him, or when I wasn't as willingly friendly as I could have been.

So, tonight as Whit and I were leaving institute we said bye to some friends, and we were trying to rush out the door so Whit could get home to go meet her mom. We knew Earl was coming up behind us, and because we were trying to rush out of there we started for the door. We heard him calling after us, so we stopped and turned around. This is about how the conversation went.

Earl: "Can i ask you girls a question?"

W & M: "Of course."

Earl: "Why do I make people feel uncomfortable?"

W & M:....speechless....at a loss for words...umm....finally..."What do you mean Earl?"

Earl: Pulls a letter out of his pocket and hands it to us.

I don't remember the exact wording, but the letter was a full page long with phrases like this:

"Earl, Could you please not come and sit by me at institute? It makes me feel really uncomfortable. I don't like it when you hug me because I feel very uncomfortable. I don't want you do do that anymore. When you come near me my friends won't talk to me, so I don't want you to come and stand by me anymore. etc. etc. etc."

It was awful. A full page of typed awfulness.

I was absolutely speechless.

I looked up at poor Earl's near-tear filled eyes, as he explained to us that he didn't feel like he had any friends in the ward.

Whit and I reassured him this wasn't the case, and that he shouldn't let this one heartless person make him feel like he didn't have friends.

It was so heartbreaking.

I was appalled that anyone could be so terrible, especially a college-age individual. I was mad at myself for initially attempting to rushing out the door without being a friend to him first. I felt glad that he trusted Whit and I enough to come to us for some consoling.

I felt like I was a little kid in elementary school again, being reprimanded for being mean.

I definitely learned my lesson.

Although I still am so sad that Earl was so mistreated, I am very glad that I had this reminder...a reminder that we all need to be a little more Christlike. A reminder that we are all children of our Father in Heaven, and our purpose here on earth is to love each other. A reminder of how easy it can be to offend, and that we could probably all be a little more careful.

I think we all have days when we ourselves are, "Earl's" and we know how it feels to be in need of a friend. On that same note, we all have "Earl's" in our lives that we can be a little kinder to as well. I guess we can all just remember that a little kindness can go a long way.