We’re dysfunctional, but we’re family

(Fictional joke; Or, Uncle Bhoy, Ate Girlie, Lola Baby, and Kuya Boy)

Dear palangga,

Don't laugh, but I have an uncle named Bhoy. (Note the additional ‘h.’) I kid you not. Oh, how he lives up to his name! You can’t imagine how he's being doted on like a baby by his mother - my lola, of course - even if he's like way past 50. Since his name is Bhoy, it goes without saying that his wife is named Ghirl. Kidding. What I mean is Uncle Bhoy is such a spoiled brat. I hate him -- don’t you already? For how could you possibly love a guy who thinks the world revolves around him, or worse, revolves around his…rubber duckie?

But Uncle Bhoy is just one among several other oddballs in my family.

Lola Baby

There’s, of course, my Lola Baby, who at 80+++ of age has certainly not just lived up to her name, but is at it for the second time around on an entirely new level. Yup, in plain language, you could say she’s having her second childhood. That means my poor mom has to take care of her needs every minute of every hour. Does she need her bath warmed up to exactly 38.5 degrees Celsius? Check. Does she have a special variety of kutsay on her egg noodles? Check. Is she running a fever? Check -- get a thermometer quick! How’s her osteoporosis doing? Fine -- maybe she needs more Anlene shots! Note: My own mother got her own 10-hour full-time job.

But all that domestic scene changes at once every time my Uncle Bhoy, who lives next door, happens to pass by to check on his mother. Guess what: Lola Baby suddenly grows up into an aging grandma. Well, just a little bit, hehe. Still ever the doting mom to her son, Lola Baby would suddenly regain her strength enough to buy Pampers and Kimbies for her baby boy, my Uncle Bhoy. She knows just what formula milk and feeding bottle brand to buy for her fave kid, who seems to be the only one she’s got when there are, in fact, fifteen others. We’re all pissed off when we see this, of course. Call it jealousy, but I don’t think so. I think it’s pure disgust.

Ate Girlie

But wait until I tell you the story of my Ate Girlie. How many times have we told her to change her name, but no go. She just love to be called Girlie, and she’s what, turning 45, almost the same age as my Uncle Bhoy. I love my Ate Girlie, but I prefer to call her Jenny, coz that’s her real name. I don’t know how she came to be called Girlie. I’ll ask her when I’m no longer too annoyed. She's simply too attached to her name. She's so in love with her name that she has figured she doesn't need a man to change it or add something to it. I think they invented a term for that: Narcissism?

Maybe she was born at a time when Americans have not yet introduced honky-tonky bars (girlie bars!) in our everyday language. Or maybe her parents were. (Wait, I mean our mom and dad.) But if I have one more wish for Ate Girlie other than to change her nickname, it is to have a healthy desire for hunks and to find her own man, so we’ll have someone to complete our weirdo family: a Kuya Boy.

Kuya Boy

Luckily, I have a close friend named Kuya Boy, whom I would’ve been glad for Ate Girlie to meet. But the problem is Kuya Boy is gay. Oftentimes, we tease him as "Ate Girl," but sometimes, he gets offended when he happens to feel more like a man at the moment he is heckled. But all in all, Kuya Boy is fun to be with, although he prefers boys more than girls most of the time. He’s an unofficial member of our family, as he has become our unofficial everything: couturier, hair stylist, interior designer, sous chef… -- even welder and electronics expert sometimes when he’s not feeling so ambivalent, or even when he does. Supposing, just supposing, Kuya Boy falls in love with Ate Girl, because something like that do happen, how would he call my Uncle Bhoy?

But that question is of no consequence, compared to what I’d secretly wish to happen: a back-to-back Boy-versus-Bhoy death match. Would Uncle Bhoy finally meet his match in Kuya Boy? I dunno. Let's wait and see.

I believe, though, that the greatest complication arises once Kuya Boy finally decides to give in to this temptation: to be everybody’s Ate even after Ate Girlie concedes and get married to him. That means that, by then, our family would be back to having only one Uncle Bhoy and one Lola Baby, but two Ate Girlies.