TravelChick

I am Short

I am Short

While it’s not entirely obvious to me, it’s something that’s instantly known to other people: I am short. I’m five foot two on a good day but that’s the liberal view of my height.

The problem with being short is not so much in the actually being short but the way that other people react to it. Aside from the limited availability of pants for short people, most average and taller-than-average height people fail to realize that being short means I can’t walk as fast as they can, can’t hold onto the hanging straps or overhead bars in subway cars, and can’t reach the top rail of clothing in stores (which is, oddly enough, where stores that do have clothes for short people often hang them).

I understand that, from the perspective of someone who is average height or taller, these are not easy things to grasp. But there are days when I don’t want to be the ambassador for short people.

Over the weekend, my tall friend and I were at Hampstead Heath and, though he’s normally conscientious of the fact that I am short, he was racing around the Heath (rather pointlessly, I thought) and expecting me to keep up. Racing around anywhere is not my idea of a pleasant Saturday. Yes, even if it’s in the park. Having raced to keep up with him for half an hour as we dashed from one end of the Heath to the other to meet his grandmother, he decided he wanted to go back to where we had set off from to have lunch.

I couldn’t do it. Having been on the go the whole day I said ‘I don’t care where we go or what I eat, it’s more important for me that I spend some non-stressful time with the two of you. I want to sit down.’ So we sat down for a while but, having been racing around most of the day, I was too tense to thoroughly enjoy the Heath on a gorgeous autumn day.

Then later that day, on the way back from the theatre, my friend jaywalked without warning, leaving me with too little time to get my short little legs across the street without being hit by oncoming traffic.

When I got to the traffic light and did cross, I pointed out that I know we’ve talked about this, that I can’t cross streets as fast as he can, and it’s pointless for him to run across streets when I’m with him because he’s just going to have to wait until I can cross, anyway. He was apologetic and I was frustrated after a day of feeling sort of put out by having to match myself to his speed.

posted by Travel Chick @ 8:49 AM