CNF: Advice and Caution, or How to Be a Tall Woman
by Erica Goss
- Forgive the boy next door who yells at you on your way to first grade. “Lurch” is one of the few words he knows.
- Breathe through the growing pains. They will last for years.
- Stand up straight. Ted Cassidy, the Addams Family’s original “Lurch,” was 6’9”, and he never slouched.
- Your brothers are tall and thin. This fact will be noted with approval.
- You are tall and thin. You’ll be compared to a certain garden vegetable.
- Your heart will start beating irregularly at age nineteen. Your back, neck and shoulders will hurt most of the time. This is normal for tall people.
- Understand: there is a height—five foot eight, perhaps—beyond which you’ll make men uncomfortable.
- Accept that the available pool of men your height is extremely limited.
- Date a short man, just once. Or twice. Leave him when his friends start asking what it’s like in bed.
- Be kind when someone asks you, ever-so-sweetly, to grab that jar from the highest shelf at the grocery store. Don’t give in to the temptation to ask that same person to pick something up off the floor for you.
- Refuse to discuss the weather up here, down there, or anywhere.
- Always wear flats.
- Remember that black makes you look taller. So do vertical stripes. You certainly don’t want to look any taller than you already are.
- Accept that your ankles and wrists will show.
- Learn to sew. Be sure to add six inches to all seam allowances.
- Explain, patiently, that at no time in your life have you ever played basketball. This will make some people angry. They will accuse you of wasting your height.
- Be aware that being tall makes you look older. Starting at age twelve, remind men that you are not eighteen. You’ll have to be firm on this one, because they won’t believe you.
- Get used to the back row.
- Get used to the view from the back row: pink scalps, dandruff. Ring around the collar.
- Get used to feeling slightly embarrassed most of the time.
- Get used to the fact that tall women in popular culture are usually depicted as freaks.
- Change the subject when someone mentions Attack of the 50-Foot Woman. Try to forget how the boy next door would yell, “Please please don’t hurt me!” rolling his eyes and pretending to be afraid of you.
- Never, ever use words with the suffix “ess,” especially “poetess” or “giantess.”
- When pregnant, be careful not to bump into people. Your belly will be higher than you realize.
- Act like you don’t know the answer when someone asks you how tall you are. Alternatively, ask that person how tall she thinks you are. Treat it like a fun way to get to know each other.
- When asked if you’ve ever modeled, respond with “Once, but it wasn’t for me.”
- Ignore articles that claim tall people die earlier than short people. Try to ignore your irregular heartbeat.
- Rejoice when studies suggest that being tall is correlated with higher IQ, higher income and lower risks of diabetes, dementia and heart disease.
- Acknowledge, ruefully, your tall, high-IQ father’s death from complications of dementia.
- Wonder why you are usually the tallest woman in the room.
- Wonder where the other tall women are.
- If you were a man, people would assume you were in charge.
Erica Goss is the author of Night Court, winner of the 2017 Lyrebird Award from Glass Lyre Press. Recent and upcoming publications include The Colorado Review, The Georgia Review, Oregon Humanities, Creative Nonfiction, North Dakota Quarterly, Gargoyle, Spillway, A-Minor, Redactions, Consequence, The Sunlight Press, The Pedestal, San Pedro River Review, and Critical Read. Erica served as Poet Laureate of Los Gatos, California, from 2013-2016. She lives in Eugene, Oregon, where she teaches, writes and edits the newsletter Sticks & Stones.
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What surprising, fascinating stuff can you tell us about the origin, drafting, and/or final version of “Advice and Caution, or How to Be a Tall Woman”?
As I grew into my tall body, I discovered that being tall is a condition people will tell you about. As a tall woman, it’s very hard to avoid attention—I’m always ready for the comment about my height that might come from someone anywhere, at any time.
I created the list as a sort of protection spell, from one tall woman to another. These were the things I had to learn the hard way. I wanted to share that wisdom with someone younger, hence the “advice and caution” of the title.
I tried to include the comical parts of being tall as well as the less amusing ones. Like most things, it’s a mixed bag. It’s taken me a lifetime to accept my body for what it is, and to appreciate it without judgment. Actually, I’m still working on that.
A few months ago, I started thinking about my life as the owner of a non-standard body. I was six when people started telling me I was tall. At such a young age, I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing, but I soon learned that it came with baggage. My mother reminded me to stand up straight while the kids in my neighborhood made tall jokes. It was very confusing.
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