Storytelling Sunday: The upside of being low down

Hello hello.

As it's the first Sunday of a shiny new month, Sian of From High in the Sky is hosting her monthly international 'Storytelling Sunday' - so, when you're finished here, make sure to swing by Sian's where you can find links to many more tales from story-sharers around the world.

As for mine ... it's not a tall tale. In fact, it's quite the opposite ...

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The Upside of Being Low Down [a story for my Height of Summer series]

At around 5'2" I'm not the tallest of folk. And, bar an unexpected [and medically miraculous] growth spurt, I think that's the height I'm going to stay.

And, let's face it:

• I'm never going to be able to reach the top shelf of my kitchen cupboards let alone become a much sought after super-model;
• I'm always going to find myself in a changing room pulling up a dress by its shoulders about 5" until the fitted bust section actually vaguely resembles the location of my own ... then wondering if anyone would notice if I wore 5" deep shoulder pads ... and ...
• There's always going to be someone who underestimates me because they think small = cute and sweet. And while I'm that too. [Obvs. ;-)] I'm also more than that.

But, actually, I'm pretty sanguine about my height these days. But I haven't always been.

Oh no.

If you think I take being called 'little' as a slur on my character now ...  woweeee you should have met me when I really was little.

Yes, I blurred out everyone's face. No, they're not about to shape-shift / teleport.

I hated it. I had a giant, proud, ego trapped inside a minute body.

If, like a teacher I had, you had once called me 'Little Julie Kirk' ... I'd still be holding a grudge against you all these years later ... trust me.

And, as for the school photographer who joked that he had a cat bigger than me ... well ... quite frankly he was lucky he lived to say 'cheeeeeese' another day.

Now, let's leap forward 20 or so years to when I had a job as a Learning Mentor in a primary school and when all of these 'little' experiences put me in the perfect position to empathise with a similarly petite ten year old ...

I was walking around the playground with Courtney, a funny, fiesty... but admittedly small girl. She must have recognised me as a kindred spirit and, from nowhere, began telling me about the height-related teasing she'd experienced from her brothers and friends:

"They tease me Miss" she stated, "because I'm little. They think it's funny."

I wasn't too concerned about this as I could tell she wasn't either ... and then, what she said next convinced me she'd get through this particular stage [and indeed, the rest of her life]  just fine ...

Because ... she didn't just repeat the words a comforting adult might have said to her, something well meaning but pretty useless, something like: "You've got plenty of time left to grow" or "Good things come in small packages" etc ...

No.

What Courtney told me, about how she handled being teased about her size.... went like this:


"I just say to them Miss ... that if we were all in a car crash ... I'd be small enough to escape through the car window ...

... and they wouldn't."

!!

Now there's a girl who, no matter where she measures on a height chart, certainly has her glass half full!


Julie :-)

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If [during August] you want to share a height/size related tale of your own then click the image below for more details: