Shorty

I tell people that I'm 5'1 on a good day. Which means that I'm 5 feet and 3/4 of an inch, but that's a little too wordy and specific. I've always been the shortest kid in my class. It was my 3rd grade dream to be in the back row for school pictures, but my dreams were dashed because per usual the short kids go in the front. Now I just know my place in the world of group pictures.

Sometimes people say incredulously to me, "wow, you're really short" and then I want to say something kind of sassy back because why is this a revelation to you? 

One time this kid in first grade named Romero called me "Little Kelli." And by one time, I mean all the time. I wrote about it in my school journal and bravely read my journal entry to the class. He made fun of me more for that. I can't say that I blame him much. Years later, I got real brave and I retaliated and somewhat aggressively kept calling him "Little Romero." He didn't actually remember me or that he called me Little Kelli for all of first grade, so that was fairly anticlimactic.  

When I started middle school, there were all kinds of kids that I hadn't met yet. They very accurately noticed that I am a little person, so people started calling me "shorty" as a (fun) nickname. I personally liked it. So I let them all call me Shorty. The problem is that several people thought it was my actual name and didn't bother to learn my real name. I stopped liking Shorty as much then.