The Curse of Being Tall

I have been living in Cyber-Land for the better part of two decades now. I first took a ride on the Internet Super Highway back around 1994. I can still recall my first experience. I went into a chat room and with all the honesty and sincerity I had, I tried to convince everyone there that my name was Bill Clinton and my wife Hilary and I were trying to find out what was on the minds of common American Youth. Nobody bought it and it is a good thing. I am, in fact, neither Bill or Hilary Clinton. My name is actually Chelsea.

During my long stay here in Hotel Cyberspace, I have done it all: chat rooms, message boards, blogging (what? you think I'm new to this?), YouTube, facebook, facepalm, napalm, Palmolive, Ivory and Ebony. I think I was even on MySpace for about five minutes. One thing people that meet me out here in the vast wasteland of Cyberspace all seem to have in common: they all guess that I am incredibly tall. And they are all incredibly right. I am very tall. I stand at a solid 5 feet 5 inches tall. Every dwarf, midget (and if they are politically correct midgets "little person"), child under 8 and every legless person I meet says that I am extremely tall. Who am I to argue with that lot?

I heard a couple of women talking today and one said to the other, "oh, look at your grandson! Look how tall he is getting!" This has always been a pet peeve of mine. I often wonder how short people feel about this. After all, I never hear a grandmother say, "oh, yes, he's remaining very short. We're so proud of his runty little self." You never hear a parent say, "well, Bill's dad is a shrimp, so we hope little Billy takes after him." People are always wishing their offspring will grow up tall, just as they wish they would grow up handsome, pretty, successful, smart, educated, athletic and completely independent by age 18. Whenever I have asked a short person if this offends them, they become hostile and shout, "you're short, too! You're shorter than me!" and they attempt to punch me in the nose, but their fist goes right over my head. I suppose this might be part of why parents and grandparents are never proud of their short offspring. Short people are usually terrible fighters.

There are many disadvantages to being tall. I have not lived out many of my life's dreams and I'm certain that being overly blessed with vertical inches has a lot to do with it. I have never gotten a job as a jockey. I have never been asked to ride in a clown car. I have never been able to walk through a Dutch door without opening both the top and the bottom. I have never won a limbo contest.

Just as white people stand up for the rights of black people, straight people stand up for the rights of gay people, men stand up for the rights of women, dogs stand up for the rights of cats and Atheists stand up for the rights of Christians, I am going to stand up for the rights of the short people in this country. Join with me, short people. Let us all join hands and sing "Kum By Ya" together. We'll follow that up with "We Shall Overcome" and "I'd Like to Buy The World a Coke". Lastly we need to finish up with "Lollipop Guild" because, quite frankly, you short people's singing voices crack me up. You all sing like you're on helium or something.