Karen Nicole Costa

I am a creature of habit. I am comforted by control. I can handle anything as long as I know what to expect. I need my expectations managed appropriately and I take great care to manage the expectations of others.

I have had a lot of loss in my life.

Death. Abandonment. People who have failed me and people I have failed. I have scar tissue: thick, callouses over my emotions, the ability to turn on and turn off emotion like a fire hose.

Yes, a fire hose. I can go from gushing, flowing, flooding to bone dry in a minute. I am not proud of this trait, but it is a learned behavior that has served me well over the years. It takes people by surprise, this mercurial behavior, this passion and expression of emotion to…

Nothing.

One minute, you are on a stage and I have shined my spotlight on you and showered you with my love. The next minute, you are in a pitch black room, alone. This, to me, is a form of control, a defense mechanism for when you leave. Notice I said “when” not “if.”

But sometimes they come back and reopen a perfectly good, closed, calloused wound. Estranged family members coming up out of the blue.

My cousin. She is seven years my junior and I haven’t seen her since she was in High School. She is now a college graduate and studying for her master’s degree. She reached out via email late last night to say hi. She doesn’t know that the reason we haven’t spoken in five years is because her mother called me to tell me that I wasn’t allowed to come to my cousin’s high school graduation unless I apologized to my grandfather who disowned me after my mother decided she was a lesbian.

I was supposed to apologize.

What for?

Being born? Being a child? Being completely not in control of my life? I was not out of control. I was not yet appointed chief decision maker of my very existence because I was eight years old.

I refused to apologize, if it was not apparent. And so, I was not allowed to come to the graduation party that I bought her an engraved Tiffanys bracelet for. I could not give her the card I picked out. I did not take her out for a celebratory lunch “just us girls.”

I faded into the distance, like the sun at dusk, hoping to remain invisible. Because once you’ve become invisible, it is very difficult to be seen again, to reappear and act normal. Whatever normal is. Because once you have filled the empty space inside your heart with caulk, polyester filling, whatever it is you use to fill up your heart (some people it’s drugs or food or alcohol or sex….I have tried a combination of all and none), it’s  so difficult to reverse the process and open yourself back up.

I feel unable to moderate my emotions between telling her I’ve missed her and I’ve always loved her like a sister and ignoring her email.So I responded. I told her that I was glad she emailed me (I am) and I told her that she looks grown up and beautiful (she is) and I told her that I hope the family is well (I hope everyone is healthy, but other than that, I am ambivalent about them).

I feel completely off balance. Thrown from my equilibrium.