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I am short. That’s right, ladies and gentlemen. Measuring in at 4’10’’ and a quarter, I am one of the shortest people I know. I am proud of every one of my 58 inches, especially the quarter-inch. They make post-Reg traffic easier to slip through, makes balancing a breeze, and puts me in a perfect position to hug anyone who needs a head on their shoulder. However, sometimes it’s hard to love my height, because I am incessantly reminded of it by the world around me.
Although most people are able to ‘overlook’ my height, some seem to have a hard time understanding that I’m, uh, small. I’ll never forget that time in 7th grade, when a boy I hardly knew looked at me and said, “Damn, Taylor, you’re hecka short.” I didn’t get what the big deal was — he wasn’t that much taller than I was, and, while I’d always been on the short side, I’d never seen myself as ‘hecka’ anything. But since then, the barrage has never stopped. My twelve-year-old sister gleefully reminds me on a daily basis that she’s finally surpassed me in height.
Some think my shortness is some kind of extreme condition. I once had a person ask me, in one breath, whether I was tall enough to go on amusement park rides and whether I could be legally classified as a midget. Another friend wondered aloud whether, if I were to wear a big jacket on a windy day, I would get blown over.
Others just tease. The other day, a friend saw me and, just for fun, started humming “We’re Off To See The Wizard”. Another called me “shortstop”. This belief that I am a munchkin, an Oompa-Loompa, a dwarf, a pocket toy, a hamster or even an armrest is enough to make me want to wear a fluffy purple jumpsuit for the rest of my life just so that people will have an even more obvious aspect of my appearance to point out.
Even the world at large offers up reminders of my stature. It’s embarrassing to need help reaching for something off a shelf most people can swipe things from with ease. Or looking in a small bathroom mirror and realizing all you can see is your forehead. Even clothes are a problem, because clothing companies assume that, if you’re the height of the average pre-pubescent, you also have the curves of one. So most petite jeans can’t get past my normal-sized butt, and pants that fit my waist are so long on me they double as socks. While these annoyances are nothing compared to what actual ‘little people’ have to go through daily, the instances where my height is a clear disadvantage are always a little demeaning.
These little moments are to be expected, and maybe one day they’ll become so rare I won’t even recognize them. However, there will always be one person who won’t ever let me forget how short I am, and that’s me. I am constantly working to get past other people’s perceptions of me. Even during those elementary school days when everyone was still the same height as I was, I despised the word “cute” and did my best to avoid it by acting like the oldest, most mature smarty-pants I possibly could.
Today, now that everyone else has sprung up around me, I still do. I walk in long strides, talk loudly, and count it at as a little victory every time I’m mistaken for a senior, a college student, or, once, for a substitute teacher. Some have asked whether this drive means I have a Napoleon complex, the kind of inferiority complex that causes short people to seek power. I don’t, because even if I were 5’9’’, I would still be pushing myself to defy expectations and work past the assumptions people judge me by. My shortness just gives me an extra push.
So the long and short of it is, while my height is a part of who I am, it has little to do with how I live my life. I may not be able to touch the top of the doorframe without jumping, but I am happy, healthy and able to climb on chairs and tables in a pinch. And while I may be the butt of many jokes, when I’m with friends and family, my height is completely unimportant. So quit pointing out what I already know. I will not be defined by my height.
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