Ramble about bodies, height, and love of little nieces...

[shadowkat]

Wrote a bit more on my novel. Not sure I like this chapter, but figure it is only the first draft. Get it out. Don't like it? Can always kill it later. (Just hard to kill later is all, one becomes oddly attached to things once they are written. This does not mean I can't kill it, just that it is hard.)

Over the phone last night, I related my experience with my neice to her grandmother (my mother).

SK: I've never in my life seen a child so in love with books. She literally was petting the pages of the book I gave her. Lovingly -
Momster: I have. You. That's how you were -
SK: But you don't understand, she was turning each page. Only three. She asked me to read the words = what did they say? And she'd loving stroke each page as if it contained buried treasure.
Momster: SK, you were like that as a child. You carried your books everywhere with you, you slept with them, you hugged them. That was you.

Oh, I love this little girl. This child of my heart. Who is not me. But who I see shades of myself in. I'm not overly demonstrative about love, I don't gush. I'm quiet like. If I give someone something, it's not often, and it is usually something I spent a lot of time thinking about, worrying over, and selecting. If I hug someone? I work myself up to it. I'm not one of those people who just does it. Part of this is because of my size and the fact that people shy away from me because of my size. The two go hand and hand. I've discovered something odd in life, nine times out of ten, short, small people tend to be huggers - they'll hug anyone, with little provocation. Total strangers. Kiss. Hug. Not think twice. But bigger people, tall people, tend to be shyer, standoffish, and don't just hug folks. Partly because we intimidate them and they run from us. And partly because of fear of rejection. And partly because it is really painful to bend in half to hug someone shorter than you. Or squat. Short folks don't get this. And since there are more short folks than tall folks (Trust me on this - I ride the subway in NYC and on most occassions, can see over everyone's heads - average size is 5'4 for women and 5'11 for men. I'm 6 foot give or take an inch. All my friends without exception are at least three to four inches shorter than me. And honestly, 5'8? Hate tell you this, is NOT tall. It's four inches shorter than me. From my perspective it is short, but from the majority's perspective? It is tall. The people at work have asked me six to eight times how tall I am and assume 6'ft at the very least. The tallest woman in the company outside of me is 5'9.) Anywho, getting down on the ground or squatting on the ground when you are 6 foot and most of that height is in your limbs, specifically your legs - my legs are 4 and 1/2 feet of my height - is not as easy as it looks. A lot of short people come to my waist or shoulders, it's really sort of funny. My neice comes up to my calf or knee, and she's tall for her age - really tall for her age. When I get on the floor beside her, I overwhelm her by my sheer size. So a great deal of it is a size thing.

I don't think you can understand another person until you are literally inside their body and walking in their shoes for a few days. That may be why body switch fantasies are so interesting to writers. Our bodies make up a great deal of who we are. And everyone's body fits them differently. We all have different issues with it. They aren't comparable really.
Just because you're body fits you perfectly, does not mean someone else's fits them. I think that's hard for people to wrap their minds around. Just like a lot of people think *yoga* is the cure-all for everyone. Not all bodies can do *yoga*. I can't. I've tried. It hurts me.
Throws out my back and results in pain. My body just wasn't designed for it. I have a body that was designed to run, swim and climb. Not bend in multiple directions. It's too big.
Couldn't do gymnastics either. But I can out-walk most people. I'm fast on my feet. Yet clumsy when the steps are small or precise.

My pal Wales is tiny. Pocketsize. Has no trouble getting guys. Fits in just about any space.
She can curl up in a movie theater seat, while I have my legs out in the aisle or cramped every which way. But she can't see over the heads of people in crowds or get through them as quickly as I can.

People say size doesn't matter in a relationship. But it does. Wales and I are constantly making compromises when we get together. She'll want to go to the middle of a row or at the very front of the theater, while it's more comfortable for me to sit further back and on the aisle. That's just one example. And when we hug goodbye, I have to bend in half to get down to her level.

Don't misunderstand me, I'm not complaining or don't mean to be. I like being tall. Can't imagine anything else. Wouldn't be me if I wasn't tall. My height is part and parcel of who I am, my personality. That's what a lot of people don't seem to understand - our bodies are part of our personality. We would be someone else outside of them. They influence our decisions, how we think, feel, reacte. I blush easily for example - you can tell just by looking at my cheeks if I'm embarrassed, angry, or what have you. (Either that or I ate the wrong thing.) If I weren't six foot, with slightly sloped shoulders, green hazel eyes (they appear green to me and oddly blue to other people - its the weirdest thing), big feet, and long limbs...I would not be me. I'd have different interests, I'd reacte differently.
And none of those things are things I chose. I choose how to reacte them, but part of that is dictated by how I interpreted the reactions to those things at an early age. So much of who we are is outside of our control, come to think of it. Yet, that doesn't mean we don't have free will or choices. It's not an either or scenario...

Oh hell. I'm going to bed. It's late and I've no clue where I'm going with this. Would you believe me if I said it wasn't planned and just sort of popped out in the midst of typing?
It did. Believe it or not...okay, now I have that damn 1980's tv show theme song in my head. Ugh.

Sleep. Goodnight. Tomorrow bekons.

Comments

[wenchsenior.livejournal.com]

Really amazing post. I'm even more amazed at myself for never really considering this before. I mean, I notice other people's body shape and size in relation to mine, but I never imagine how I'd be different if I was, you know...different.

It's weird, though, that I was well into my twenties before I got an accurate mental idea of my actual size. For years, I'd thought of myself as large and lumbering and clumsy and I think it affected how I moved and reacted. In my mid-twenties, my mental frame finally caught up with reality (I'm a LOT smaller than I thought I was...not shorter, just smaller). Sometimes, I still forget, and find it strange that my husband calls me, "The Wee One."

How weird.

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

I don't know if you remember Jane from the Buffy Cross and Stake Spoiler Board, but she's very tall too. I think we looked funny together when I visited her in 2004 for I'm about SMG's size!

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

No, after my time, I think. ;-)

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

Oh no she was posting there long before my time!

But the board was so active and there were so many posters then...

[ann1962]

I can totally relate to this post.

I was that girl with the books too, and thankfully, so are my kids. I will forever remember them sleeping with their books, hugging them, getting so much joy!! And when your young niece learns to read, just wait for your reaction. You will be overwhelmed.

And since there are more short folks than tall folks

This is true but living in the midwest has taught me they grow them a lot bigger here. Like you I was always the tallest person in any given situation. I almost always am even now, but less often. Women are regularly >5'9" here. I can look them straight in the face. Locals don't think it odd, but I am *still* getting used to it. I rarely look straight at, or even less often, up at people.

How physicality affects people I find fascinating. How that interacts with our environment. I can't imagine being pocket sized. I never have been. I have to say I am not sure I would like feeling so little, powerless? maybe, as I have gotten used to the advantages of having height. It removes some of the interaction I see smaller women have to deal with. That would annoy me having to have to deal with that sort of thing any more often than I have to.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Depends on where in the midwest, I think. Kansas City, people were pretty short, same with Colorado Springs - albeit not as short as NYC.
The north - Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, the Dakotas, Iowa, Montana,
and Nebraska - do have taller folks - because the people who settled that region came from Northern Europe - and by Northern Europe, I mean Sweden, Germany, Finnland, Norway, Scotland, Ireland - where people tend to grow taller. I'm part German - and German's tend to be pretty tall on average. (Depending on the region). Same with the Irish. (Also depends on the Region.) And Belgium. (Which grows them tall as well.)

NYC is mostly settled by Southern Europeans (who are short - Spainish, Italian, French, Portugese), Mediterean (sp?) (very short), Middle Eastern, Indian, Asian (Southern China, Japan, Indonesia, Taiwan, Vietnam, Korea - lots of Korean), Irish,
South American, Mexican, Puerto Rican, Jewish, Dutch, Russian - and for reasons that escape me, most are fairly short. Not many Finns or Swedes or Germans in the bunch. That group headed towards the farmland.

I think if you live amongst those who are the same size as you are, it is different somehow. But it's not just height. It's also weight and bone size. My mother is five nine for example, but has smaller bones than I do, as does my brother who is 6'5. They also both weigh a lot less. My brother is 6'5 and 165 pds. I'm, without going into detail, considerably bigger.

[wenchsenior.livejournal.com]

The height differences might even vary by city within the Midwest...I'm from Wisconsin, and there are a lot of big-gish people there, but WI also has a very high obesity rate. I remember a lot of people being large, but not necessarily unusually tall.

However, I lived in the twin cities, MN for a few years, and the women there were really tall. It wasn't at all unusual to see several women of your height just running to the grocery store, and women in the range of 5'9" to 6' were everywhere. Now I live in Texas, and tall women seem to be represented on a more typical bell curve in this town.

[arethusa2.livejournal.com]

That's right; there are lots of women my height (5'9") in Houston but I'm still considered fairly tall here.

Shadowkat, at the New York meet I actually felt rather short next to you and Ann. It was a very unusual feeling for me! But even weirder is seeing my daughter get as tall as I am--she's only two inches shorter now, and might still be growing. Yet she still thinks of herself as a lot smaller than I am. Her mind will take a while to catch up.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I grew up in the 1950s and '60s in Orange County, California. When I started high school I was 5'7", and when I graduated I was 5'9-1/2", which I have remained (haven't lost any as I've aged). I was the tallest girl in my class all the way through school, though by the time I was a senior there were a couple of the younger girls who was as tall as I was. Growing up, I almost never saw another girl/woman as tall as I was.

My mother was 5'4", and I passed her up by the time I was 11 or 12. Her sister, whose family lived two blocks away, was only about 5'2", and her daughters were all in my mother's and aunt's height range. I definitely grew up thinking of myself as really tall.

When I moved to Minnesota at 24, it was a shock: every day I saw women and girls as tall as I, even taller. Context makes a lot of difference.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Context makes a lot of difference.

Yep. I've joined a tall club - so I know there are tall folks in NYC who are much taller than I am. In the US, women can only join Tall Club if they are 5'10 and above. In Europe, you have to be at least 6 feet. Men? in US - 6 feet and above. In Europe same deal.

When I hang out with the tall club, I feel short. Tiny in fact. Most of the women and men in that club aren't just tall, but big boned and large framed.

Yet, I rarely see them in the city or on the subway. On the subway, at work, on the street - head and shoulders taller than everyone else it seems. As a child - I grew up in PA - they didn't grow taller than 5'6 if that. I was 5'11 in the tenth grade. And 5'9 by the 5th grade.
Stopped growing in 11th grade at around 5'11 and a 1/2 or 6 foot. In KC, people were a little taller, but not by much, and most men don't get tall until they are 16 or 17. My brother was shorter than me when I graduated from high school - we're three years apart. Two years later, when he turned 17, he shot up. Went from 5'10 to 6'5 practically over night. When people meet him, they have a look like - oh, I get why you're sooo tall now - which makes me laugh. Because in college one of my closest friends was 4 foot tall. But her brother was 6'5.

My grandmothers were tall for their age - 5'6 and 5'8 respectively, grandfathers -6'3/6'4. Mother? 5'9. Her sister? 5'10. Oldest sister? 5'7 and 1/2. My dad's brothers? 5'10-6'4. His sisters? 5'6-5'9. I'm the tallest female grandchild and my brother is the tallest male grandchild of the group for both sides. Although my mother's sister's side - they live in Michigan, has two sons who are 6'3/6'4 and 300 pounds - they look bigger than my brother who is 6'5 and 165 pds.

So much of it is who are you around. I've never dated a guy taller than me. Every man who has ever been remotely interested in me for some reason or other, comes to my shoulder, which always posed problems. Rarely meet guys who are taller - hence the tall club.
For reasons I don't completely understand - all my friends have been 5-6 inches shorter than me. Don't know why? Location? Circumstance?
Shrugs. Just is.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

The Collected Stories of Winnie The Pooh by AA Milne- the Illustrate version, with Shepards original watercolor illustrations. In hard back with large easy to read lettering that won't make parents go blind.

(For Xmas I'd gotten her Madeline and Winnie the Pooh. Apparently she had little use for Madeline (wasn't into it either when I was a kid or an adult), but became a Winnie the pooh addict.)