Get Shorty

This post is triggered by a comment from someone who met me for the first time - "you are smaller than I thought". For the record, I am all of 5 feet 2(and a half, if you don't mind) inches. That's quite bad, yes? Well no, considering how my mom is shorter than me. Everytime one of those "why me?" moments strike me, I just look at her or go stand next to her and comfort myself with the selfish thought that things could have been much worse.

My problem lay in the fact that I shot up too early. While the rest of my class still looked like they were in kindergarten, yours truly was the tallest in her class(*sigh* those were the days). My brother, who now towers more than half a foot over me, used to be shorter than me! The local bus conductors never used to believe than I am younger than 12 years of age and hence refused to part with a "half ticket", insisting on the full fare. My future looked bright(and tall?) and I was happy thinking that I had taken to my dad's side in matters of height. Little did naive old me know of the cruel trick nature had to play.

In case you didn't know, it's a cruel world out there for short people. Let me start the griping with the public transport system. I travel daily to office in the company bus, which is owned and leased by the government transport department. The buses have bars above to hold on to. Guess what, I barely reach it. So all I can do while walking down the aisle just before the bus stops and when the driver applies those oh so soft brakes, is to break my fall using the support of other seats. If and when my hands are full, I pray.

Then there are the new buses where there is a support or an extension which is to help out vertically challenged people like me. Now I am not sure which Einstein was consulted for the design but I ask you this, what is the use of such a support if it is not fixed! Instead of flying freely, now you have the choice of flying till a certain range, is that it?!

Seats are next on my list. The more comfortable the place/mode of transport is, the longer their seats will be, hence more difficult with stubby legged people like me! Tall people have legspace problem, I have hanging legs problem. My feet don't touch the ground and when they do, they fail to make contact with the leg rest provided. Solution? Sitting cross legged. Ensuing problem? Not exactly a dignified solution.

I can go on and on, but something(I think the time) tells me I should stop. Maybe in the coming years they will have customised products and facilities for short yet not dwarves or disabled people. Till that day, I have my heels to help me out.