A couple days a week I am met with the sound of “Hey Chicken Fat” coming from the hall outside my door. As I swing my chair around to look out I am always met with the huge smile that crosses my little sandy blond haired friend’s face. I can’t help but smile when I see him. I often reply with “Hey Chicken Fat” right back to him. He will then come into my office and play with the stuff on my desk or just hang out with me and tell me what he is going to do today.
Ok, so now you want to know why he calls me Chicken Fat. I am sure you think it is because I am a portly fellow, but its not. Well, one day he came to the church with his mom and while she and I were running around doing a couple of things, he was with us and he kept calling me names. He called me “eyeball, door, shoe, sock, Mr. Potato head, Seminole (his dad is a FSU fan), Tar Heel (his mom is a UNC fan), window, and tree.” After all those different names, imagine my surprise when he hits me with Chicken Fat. I didn’t know how to take that until his mom said “I don’t know where he got that from, he just started to say that the other day when we were at the mall.” So I smiled at him and said “no, your name is Chicken Fat.” For the next couple of days it was “your Chicken Fat”, “no your Chicken Fat.”
Well, obviously it stuck. Ever since then, we have both been Chicken Fat. He calls me Chicken Fat and I call him Chicken Fat. Every time I see him its “Hey Chicken Fat!” But nothing and I mean nothing puts a smile on my face faster than hearing him calling my name (Chicken Fat) or seeing him run into my office!
His mom came into my office one day and said, “Eric you made the list,” I said “What List?” Last night when his Dad took Chicken Fat up to go to bed he told him to say his prayers. Chicken Fat got down on the side of the bed and bowed his head and said “God bless, Mommy and Daddy, and Grandma and Grandpa, and my sister, and God bless Chicken Fat.” So you made the list. I told her that was the funniest and most touching thing I think I have ever heard.
They say God works in mysterious ways. Nothing is more mysterious than “Chicken Fat.” Who knows where it came from and honestly I don’t care. God knows when you need a pick me up and he puts things there when you need them. The little sandy blonde haired boy with the big smile can call me Chicken Fat whenever he wants for as long as he wants. He needs to watch out though, because when he’s 16 and in my youth group, that’s right, I will still be calling him Chicken Fat!
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