Standing Tall

The woman in the restroom at Manchester Airport was tall – tall as in well over six feet. She was putting on mascara, standing in that classic applying-make-up stance, the upper half of her body tilted forward, mouth slightly open, one hand braced on the counter, the other carefully brandishing mascara wand, her eyes fixed on her image in the mirror. My daughter and I stood drying our hands, watching her surreptitiously: she was that compelling. I felt a wave of sympathy for her: it’s not easy being the tallest woman in town. Believe me, I know.

When I was studying in Kyushu, I was the tallest woman in the university. I’m barely 5 feet 7 inches tall, but in Japan, this was colossal. My next-runner-up in the tallness department was a graduate student in social studies who stood almost 5 feet 6. Our height was all we had in common, but we bonded over it.

Wherever I went on campus, people stopped talking and turned to stare. Part of this was because I was a foreigner, but my shorter foreign friends hardly ever got the attention I got. “Wow, you’re tall,” was a comment I soon got sick of. My first week there, in a restroom, I was washing my hands at the sink when a woman came out of the cubicle behind me. She froze, falling back against the toilet door and clamping her hand over her mouth as she stared up at me. Another woman entered the restroom just then and I got stereo shock as they both gazed at me in wonder. “God, she’s tall!” one of them breathed to the other. I felt so foolish, so awkward. I dried my hands and stomped out, my face burning.

Every morning, when I took the train to my university, I spotted another woman who must have been at least my height—possibly even taller. She was Asian and spoke fluent Japanese and she never paid me the slightest bit of mind, but looking at her, I always felt a strong bond. I knew that she knew what it felt like. In a country where 165 centimeters – around 5 feet 6 – is considered the upper limit for feminine height, you can’t help but feel your tallness as a mark of your identity. I knew she must struggle to find trousers that went down to her ankles, skirts that covered her knees. I knew that with her long legs, wearing panty hose was not a comfortable option. I never got up the courage to ask her where she found her clothes, but I came close.

I happen to be the product of a short mother and a very tall father. My father was 6 feet 4 inches, and my mother was 5 feet 2. Though she was short, my mother had a certain physical grace that my father, the classic klutz, lacked entirely. My mother stood tall and proud; my father slumped and ducked his head, as though ashamed. So I did not grow up thinking that tallness was an advantage – quite the contrary. In college, my roommate was 4 feet 11 inches and unhappy about it. She refused to accept that I could justifiably be envious of her petite stature, but I was. I longed to be slight and compact. To be dainty and light-footed and short.

Watching this tall woman now, I was filled with sympathy -- but even more with admiration. She did not slump; she stood tall. She was taking pains with her appearance, and she liked what she saw. My daughter is tall too—taller than I am now—and she’s still growing. I want her to be like this, not slumping and skulking about, apologizing to the world for the extra space she’s taking up.

The woman snapped her make-up bag shut. She ran her long fingers through her hair and shook it out, tilting her head from side to side. “Kakko ii ne,” my daughter whispered in Japanese — She looks good. I nodded in agreement: she did.


And do you know what the best part about her was? She was wearing high heels. Not just wimpy little heels, but proper, three-inch ones -- the kind I would never go near. We watched as she click-clicked her way to the door, all willowy, graceful style.

We’d have liked to give her a high five, but neither of us could reach.