All Boys are Momma’s Boy

My mother woke me up at 5 am today. We planned to buy some groceries in the market since she prefers to buy fresh foods and she doesn’t want to huddle with the crowd too. Aside from that, you can see the price difference if you buy earlier than 8 am.

Usually, she goes alone because she really finds it hard to wake me up. I guess I’m not just really a morning person. But since she’ll buy a grocery worth for a week or more, then she did try everything just to wake me up.

As we’ve reached the market, she immediately did her business—going back and forth, buying everything on the list. She can’t trust me with this matter so she’s always doing the groceries. At this age, I admit that I can’t still be trusted when it comes to buying groceries. I don’t know how to choose a nice meat, what more when it comes to fishes and other stuff.

Funny that I always prepared myself to be independent and to live on my own yet I don’t know how to properly buy groceries. I bet if I was living alone right now, everything that I was eating is instant foods. Though I know how to cook but I’m not an expert in that department.

Anyway, after buying everything we need, we stopped in a bakery to buy some bread of salt or mostly known as ‘Pandesal’. As my mother was paying, I was sitting on one of the tables while waiting for her. At the adjacent table, I saw a family who is about to go. The mother and the father were talking while the little boy, whom I think seven years old, was taking his last sip of Yakult. When he’s done, his father extends his arms so he could carry him but the boy went to his mother instead and let her carry him.

I then thought to myself if was all boys really a momma’s boy? There’s nothing wrong with it anyway since I’ve noticed that a son was more close to his mother while a daughter was closer to her father. Maybe because mothers favor the son while fathers treat their daughters like princesses and spoil them. I don’t know for others too but that’s what I have noticed.

I then remember an event way back in senior high school. It’s a class cheerdance competition so everyone was expected to participate since our final grades will be based on that. We didn’t win but since we did all of our best so we still had a little celebration after that. It happened at our classmate’s house. And since it’s a call for celebration, then the liquor was present. Juices were for the ladies while liquors were for the guys.

It is one of the memories that I couldn’t easily forget. It is a happy memory and also an emotional one. Maybe it was really true, that a person cannot lie if he’s drunk. As the night grows, slowly the guys are getting drunk. But not that of a wasted, they still know when to stop or when to continue and besides, we are there so we can also stop them if they already had enough.

It started when one of them mentioned our performance earlier that day. Vin was considered as the ‘Kuya’ for us even if his age wasn’t that far from us. He’s a kuya in the way of responsibilities and the guys also follow his leads so we always count on him. That time, Vin mentioned his mother. He said that even once, he wanted his mother to see him dance. He’s talented in the dancing department but even once, his mother didn’t see him on stage or whenever he performs. He just wanted his mother's acknowledgment.

Everyone fell quiet and as he became emotional, the atmosphere changes too. It's funny how the mood changed easily, a while ago we are all laughing our hearts out, and then after a blink of an eye, everyone felt heavyhearted.

I don’t know if they are just drunk or they just really wanted to follow Vin’s footstep or if the liquor did really tug something in them. Slowly every one of them is opening up. One of them shares to us how hard it is for him to be in a broken family and only his mother is the one who’s working hard to provide for them. One tells us his greatest regrets, and that is when he felt embarrassed about his mother and he told his friends that she was their maid. One also tells us how hurt it is when he made his mother cry by saying he wanted her to die. 

Confessions after confessions. Tears after tears. No one expects this to happen. That night supposed to be a celebration for us but everyone is crying while sharing how they wronged their mothers and how deeply they regret it. Me, on the other hand, who couldn’t control my emotions was still crying like there’s no tomorrow even if they are done and started to make some jokes again. They even made fun of us who cries even if the one who’s telling the story wasn’t crying at all.

But, no. They cried. Boys will always be boys. Even if they did really cry and break down that time, they would still deny it like we don’t witness it at all. It’s weird and fascinating at the same time to see a guy opening up to not just his guy friends but even to us, their girl friends. Since we all know that guys had this pride in them and they all think that crying is for gays and weak.

No one may mention it but we all know and we already understood how they love their mothers so much. Yes, they made those mistakes and won’t let anyone even their mothers see that they regret it but deep down it’s suffocating them. 

This is why I can say that all boys are momma’s boy, not in a way that they like to cling to their mothers or they always had their mothers as their back-ups, but because every boy loves their mothers so much. They wouldn’t show it but you can feel it. Not everyone can be showy to their mothers, some would be shy and choose to show it in their own ways.