The Prodigal Son Returns (Part 1)

Boy moms, siblings in collusion, and my puppy pandering to men.

If you Google ‘boy mom culture’, you’ll go down a rabbit hole of some peculiar behaviour exhibited by, well, boy moms. Mothers of sons. Not all mothers of sons are this way, of course, because this syndrome chooses its victims.

These are the proud, beaming, puffed-up-chested women whose lives begin and end revolving around their Raja Beta. Their boy is the best boy. He gets all the marrow bones at lunchtime, and his mother swears it is just by coincidence. He just tumbled into it. She is a feminist, you know. Equal rights and all.

Thankfully, I haven’t met too many of those. Until now. It appears I share my room with a Boy Mom - I just never noticed.

My grandfather’s old villa, in the suburb of Al Twar, was a little haven surrounded by bougainvillea and neem trees. Until my sister was born, I spent most of my time in that house - the one my mum and her brother were raised in.

In a house with one son and one daughter, the competition was intense.

One is Sports Captain. The other is an artist.
One is shrewd. The other is not allowed to be a dreamer.
One successfully runs not one, not two, but seven restaurants all over Dubai (all over Dubai!!). The other has some kind of painting class. (Read about it here - most of my relatives won’t).

I hope you see where I’m going with this.

My uncle has always been, to me, the personification of cool. His hair was cool, his clothes were cool, his jokes were cool, his car was cool, his job was cool (he worked in a bank - so clearly he was rich), and his favourite cartoons were cool (he was the only adult I knew who liked Cartoon Network - and this automatically elevated my opinion of him). He chewed gum and smoked cigarettes. He always had pretty girlfriends and a Blackberry, and then one day he had a very pretty wife and probably a newer, cooler Blackberry.

Honestly, he was my role model. That didn’t really change much, from then to now.

But if he’s my role model, my grandmother worships the ground he walks on. When there was news of him coming to visit for the weekend, her hearing problem vanished into thin air. The rooms were swept three times each, the bedsheets re-done. It did not matter that the house had already been cleaned.
It needed to be cleaner. It needed to be perfect.

Suddenly the 77 year old woman who was absolutely 100 percent certain she has osteoporosis, and corns on her feet, and low blood sugar - was running around the house. Her arthritis went on vacation. Her nerve endings miraculously renewed themselves.

The Gods themselves came down to earth and granted her the full health of a 25 year old so she could keep the house clean for her boy.
“If there is even one molecule of dust, he will sneeze, Kaavi. It has to be sparkling.”

When I told her I’ve had the same reaction for years, her hearing problem made a small reappearance.

My mother rolled her eyes in my direction. She was used to this.

But onto the main event! The prodigal son returns!

We picked up my Mama from the airport, and the ride home was a mini-sightseeing trip of Bahrain, filled with the stories other people had told us when we first arrived here. Quickly, the conversation turned into collusion: my mother transformed into a girl, a sibling, the older sister of days yonder! Both siblings had a plan: to get their Mum to have a long conversation without an emotional outburst. Tactics were discussed, weapons declared, sensitive topics reiterated so no one would fall into any old traps.

Honestly, my mom and uncle were behaving like me and my sisters preparing for a conversation with them.

Once we drove into the garage, polite faces were turned on. They were ready. I was mostly just watching this whole thing for the plot.

We rang the bell, and within a millisecond, Ammamma opened the door in an organza saree. Hugs, chatter, the wheeling in of a suitcase. My Shih Tzu, Madonna, peed herself in excitement. Gifts from duty free were showered upon everyone. The house was perfumed with spiced mutton, stewing away in the slow cooker since 5 AM. The ghee rice, sitting on the dining table in our best serve ware, like a little model dressed to the hilt.

As we sat down to eat, he looked at the food.

“Man, I haven’t had a meal like this in years.”

We sat and ate like we used to, in my grandfather’s villa, 15 years ago.

Ammamma couldn’t stop smiling.