Well, then specifically for height, I’m tall without being a giant.
However, I don’t want to be this tall. Short people, I understand, you hate it. I’d hate it too if I had to get a running jump to sit on a bar-stool, or if I was repeatedly denied the chance to ride particularly thrilling roller coasters.
You poor, deprived, shorties
Super tall people? You’ve got it bad too. You’re stuck trying to fit into doorways designed for comparatively tiny individuals, you’re living in reality and yet stuck feeling like Gulliver. I can’t imagine what it’s like to shop for clothes, and realize that your exorbitant demands for more and more cloth are likely the sole reason sweatshops stay open.
It has to be quite disheartening.
The kind of tall where they make you into a statue...Strangely tall
But for people like me, we’re stuck in the terrible land of near importance. We’re stuck being tall enough that planes aren’t comfortable, but complaining will make us seem like merely obese whiners, where knocking our head is still funny instead of tragic, and where we’re large enough to inspire fear in children, yet not in their parents.
Effectively, we’re just large enough to be inconvenient without the joys of being abnormal enough to warrant fascination, praise, or to be able to easily reach the top shelf at the hardware store.
It’s a terrible, terrible place to be.
Let me explain:
In 2008, I was living in a little duplex with a few of my friends. They, blessed with middling height and narrow shoulders, regularly enjoyed themselves by going out and strolling about the pitiable excuse for a town that my college was located in. No children gawked, and no old women demanded help with groceries. They were large enough to be masculine, small enough to be ignored, and I was left jealous.
This summer, you see, a cat had wandered into our lives.
My friends and I had recently moved, a longer story (that involves electrocution, sewage water, and a very exciting end to freshman year of college) that I won’t get into now, but suffice it to say, we were living in a small duplex, and had forgotten the basics of living in a confined space.
We tended to leave our belongings out, take up space we didn’t have, and more often than not, we tended to waste our time on weekends playing video games rather than addressing the clear and present danger of food poisoning from so much food being left out.
And then came the kitten.
Now, I’m prepared to be hated for this statement, but I must admit the truth: I hate cats. I hate them because they claw, and bite. I hate them because they’re odorous, and rarely if ever show affection. I have a mild allergy to them, which means I have enough reason to complain, yet not a severe enough allergy to actively avoid them. TRULY, THEY ARE MY BANE.
I see evil...pure evil.
She was abandoned, and we didn’t know how to find her mother, so while myself and my roommates searched for a good home to keep her permanently, we were forced to allow the vile little demon to live in our home, or face the obvious hateful vengeance of Karma, if we turned the horrid little wretch away.
Seriously, look again....straight to hell if I left her outside. STRAIGHT TO HELL
When I face most animals, they fear me.
There are noted exceptions, like when I worked with sea mammals and regularly found myself pursued by the banshee-like barks of seals and sea lions.
But normally, animals leave me alone. As an aspiring biologist, this comes in handy. I love the animals, treat them well, and even pamper those lovable fluffy few who come near me, but when it comes to small animals like cats, rodents, and birds, I’m usually met with the utter and abject terror befitting a man of great size, and greater hairiness. This cat, however, did not care. She felt no fear. She was the Dalai Lama of cats, smiling and playfully swatting the many stabs of evil and creeping terror that should have naturally floated her way with a feline smile adorable swipe of her tiny clawed feet.
She was, for all intents and purposes, immune to the effects my size, deep voice, and admittedly brusque demeanor should have had on her. No, instead, she decided I was her mother.
I did my best to discourage her. Whenever I sat down, I would take up the whole couch, trying to discourage her joining me. She persisted, and pounced onto my lap.
I would shower, and close the door, only to hear a pitiable mewling that didn’t stop until I, wet and dripping, exited the shower and ran to my room, determined to close the door before she slithered in. I was in allergy….well, not hell, since it was just slightly itchy eyes and mild congestion, but I was in allergy purgatory of sorts. Unpleasant, but as far as I could tell, not as bad as I’d worried.
I sought the help of my roommates, asking that they keep the cat away from me. I was met with giggles, and the occasionally amusing antic of finding new and exciting ways to drop the cat onto me while I was sleeping.
Finally, I had had enough. I was determined for the feline menace, its tiny claws and tinier wicked little heart, to be gone. I found out a time for her to leave for a new home, and eagerly awaited the day I could be rid of the little demon. Finally, I would be back to my previous stature, just barely large enough to be feared, and properly so, by the other animals around.
And with that pleasant thought, I fell asleep, lying back on the couch in the living room, on a warm summer afternoon.
And I awoke to this.
Yeah, all up in my business.
We finally realized the kitten’s purpose. It wasn’t convinced I was its mother, it was convinced my beard was. My manly badge of hairy courage, the device I’d grown to prove to the world my adorable baby-face was a lie, had become the surrogate mother of this little critter. And I, against all odds, found this endearing.
The cat had, like a volcano erupting in a snowstorm, blown away my icy and frigid beliefs, melted my resistance, and was purring gently as it stroked my beard, and fell asleep on my sniffling and red-eyed face.
I went back to sleep, and awoke to my roommate standing over me, with my camera in hand, going back over the pictures I’d taken of that cat.
“So,” he said, a grin on his face, “I take it we aren’t cat-haters anymore? Big man likes the tiny cat?”
I stared back and offered the only response I could, “No! I still hate cats.” I paused and looked down at the gently sleeping kitten. “But not this one. She’s…” I paused for effect, before raising my voice to a feminine squeal, “so freakin’ cute, just the cutest little kitty in the world!”
My roommate stared at me, stoic, before tossing the camera back at me, and walking to his room. His parting words were, “Yeah, Brian, you’re a terrifying behemoth of manliness. Large, and in charge.”
And that, friends, is how I lost all credit as a man, lost my hate for that particular cat (though I retain disdain for all others), and was cat-burgled of my manhood.
Thanks for reading,
Keep laughing,
Brian
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