“I’m not short, I just like to push my driver’s seat forward all the way.”

“I’m not short. You’re just too tall.” (That’s my favorite.)

“I’m not short. I’m fun sized.”

I’m 5’1/5’2. This is sometimes considered short. I may have what’s called “short person syndrome,” which is when a short person thinks they’re bigger, cooler, tougher,  smarter, more attractive, than they really are in order to compensate for their lack of vertical movement.

Thus, I have a problem truly calling myself “short.”

Somehow I have surrounded myself with girls my height, some even shorter, which plumps my pride in this regard a little more.

I’ve been the smallest since elementary school, when they told us to line up by height. I would automatically make my way to the back of the line (sometimes they’d switch it and I’d be in front!), until one day this boy showed up, who was apparently fourteen with a mustache but had a growing disability.

And. He. Took. My. Place. In. Line.

I didn’t take that too lightly. I thought for sure he cheated. It wasn’t fair. He was older than me by years yet he got to be at the end? I wanted to petition that we’d do it by age instead, but I did the math and realized that would put me in a worse place in line. I resigned to silence and looking forward to the days he didn’t come when I could reign mini-supreme again.

People would look down on me sometimes because I was short. But, because of the type of personality I have, I always found ways that made short people better than tall people.

For example.

Short people stand up straight. It may be because we want to look taller. But there are also health and spine benefits to this. Tall people tend to hunch over and try to blend with all the shorties. Or “average heights.”

Want to hear a sad story? When I was in middle school, I was so happy. So happy. The doctor told me I was 5’1. I sighed and said something along the lines of, “yeah, I’m small” to which she replied, “actually that’s average.”

Average! I left that doctor’s office singing from the rooftops.

I WAS AVERAGE!!!!

Eight years later, at barely 5’2…. Don’t do the math for me… I know I’m below average.

Whatever the case, like in elementary school, I took a certain pride in having the “shortest person in the room” slot reserved for me and me alone. To this day, I feel awkward talking to someone shorter than me. It makes me uncomfortable. I feel rude, turning my head down to them. I don’t even know how to hug, I instinctively go under people’s arms, which make for the most awkward hugs when that person is shorter.

One of my good friends, Julie, (you’ll have seen a lot of her in my fashion and baking blogs) is about 4’9. That took a lot of getting used to, I have to admit! Suddenly, I was the tall friend. I kind of didn’t like it. Made me feel freak-ish, ha.

No offence to tall people!

It’s just that when you’re short, and you spend your life resigning to the fact that you’re short, and someone comes along who’s shorter, thrusting you into tall-dom, it messes you up a little bit.

After middle school, all the friends that I shared short person jokes and anecdotes with began to sprout up. Amy used to feel my pain. Heather used to be teased even more than me, yet last time I saw her, I was in heels and she was barefoot and that was the only way our height matched.

I became below average and left behind to fend for myself.

I came up with other random things that gave short people a leg up.

We didn’t have anyone looking up our noses.

If you’re short, you have to admit, you look up, and, well, you see things.

And short people always have leg room, even if people are always trying to take it from us by making us sit in the middle seat of the car.

Short people also have cute little feet.

So never let anyone take these things away from you! You be that professional step-stool pusher in the kitchen! Show that high cupboard who’s boss! You stand up straight! You go and shop in the kid section at Payless, and Walmart, and Target, and Burlington, because you can!

Short people rule!

Haha. I feel like that should be.

SHORT PEOPLE RULE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can make jokes.