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Tuesday, July 27, 2010

My Calves are Permanently Flexed

As a little girl, I used to love holidays like Easter and Christmas when my mom would buy me a new pair of shoes with little one-inch heels.  I would leave them on all day and walk up and down our hallway until my mom would yell at me to stop because I was making her dizzy.  I remember asking her if I could wear my fancy heels to school, but she would say "no"  and that heels were just for "special occasions".

Then, sometime during the peak of the Spice Girls craze, also around the same time I started plucking my eyebrows (should've started when I was 5! They were monstrous!) and wearing lipstick, my parents decided to let me wear heels to school.  Most of my friends were obsessing over Eastbay catalogues and talking about which Nikes they were going to get next, but I wasn't really into that.  I liked wearing my heels. I loved the way wearing heels made my walk feel more graceful and feminine... not to mention, I was freakin' 3-inches taller!  I wore heels everyday to school from the 8th grade until I graduated high school (changing during P.E. and badminton practice, of course).  Same in college. To this day, you will rarely see me in flats... no matter how much I wish I could.

This is how I feel standing next to Matthew in flats

You see, I'm short... and my husband is not. He's 6'3'' while I am 5'0'' (give or take 1/8 of an inch).  That's a whole 15-inch difference.  Without shoes, I reach his chest.  If he were to walk looking straight ahead, I probably would not be in his line of vision and he'd walk straight into me (this has never happened of course, but I'm sure it could)!  Matthew loves me and doesn't care about my height, but I sometimes feel super conscious about it.  I'm totally fine around my family and circle of friends since we're all roughly similar in elevation, but when I'm around my hubs' family and friends that's a whole other story. 

I'm not sure if they're ready to make their blog debut, so I've drawn a representation of what it looks like when I take a picture with Matthew and his siblings:

This is with heels, too!  I know no one really cares and most of the time I don't either, but sometimes I wish I were just a few inches taller.  Because I'm not, I've resorted to constantly wearing high heels.  They need to be at least 3-inches, but can be as high as 5" before my walk gets compromised.   Unfortunately, the only type of flats I have in my closet are either running shoes, uggs, or flip flops. 

When I take pictures with flats on, I make sure to stand on my tiptoes so my legs are elongated and I can continue the illusion that I'm 5'3''.  There are so many cute, stylish ballet flats and sandals that I am always so tempted to buy... but I just can't pull the trigger.  There have been many days where I just want to make a quick trip to the store and wish I had some cute slip-ons to wear for comfort, but since I never buy any, I have to strap on my 4" stilettos just to buy eggs!! It's insane. 

I am so concerned about this stupid height thing that I almost wore 7-inch shoes on my wedding day!  Thank goodness I did not because I probably would have face planted numerous times throughout the day! 



What about you... were you blessed with the height gene and don't have to worry about being tall enough to reach the cereal boxes on the top shelf?