lifestyle

20 shortcomings of being taller than average.

Kahla and Nat.

 

 

 

 

 

by KAHLA PRESTON

If I were to perform an audit of all the things people have ever said to me, the top three would look something like this:

1. How’s the weather up there?

2. Do you play basketball?

3. How tall are you?

Welcome to the life of a taller-than-average person.

Not a day goes by where my height – around 6ft, if you’re curious – is not acknowledged at least once. Sometimes it’s the helpful stranger who remarks, “Wow, you’re tall!” (Really? Well, why has nobody pointed that out to me before?); other days it’s the tiny old lady who needs a hand reaching the top shelf in the supermarket.

Look, I won’t deny that there are benefits to being tall. I’ve never had to raise the hem on my jeans, I rarely have visibility issues at concerts, and strangers often assume I hail from some exotic Nordic location. I don’t, by the way – although it’s fun to pretend, jah?

But there are also many, many shortcomings (not literally, you understand).

Plane, train and bus travel becomes a lesson in contortion. Big feet, that require shoe sizes that rarely exist. Door frames loom perilously close to the top of my head. And it’s impossible to hear my petite friends when they talk amongst themselves in noisy locations, meaning I have to perform my best Quasimodo impersonation and stoop over.

Alas, I’m not alone – Buzzfeed feels the pain of my people. They’ve compiled this handy gallery of all the inconveniences of being a giant among mere mortals, which is so overwhelmingly relatable I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Do you have a physical feature that people constantly comment on?