Seeing the title of this article, you might be thinking giant pants. Could this be a story of a person who lost hundreds of pounds, who is now faced with the dilemma of what to do with their oversized slacks?
Well, think again, this is a true story about a middle-aged woman’s search for dress pants at the local mall. Me!
Shopping! What a gloriously adrenaline infused experience, when woman go on the hunt for that perfect garment.
However, I am not just any ordinary middle-aged woman. Oh no! I am only 3 foot 2 inches tall! Yes, I am a little person, a dwarf. Finding pants when you have a 16-inch inseam when most adult size woman’s pants can be 30 inches or more is disheartening at best.
That’s what I get for eating too much chocolate and never dieting; I do the most logical thing, I just get a bigger size. Oh, to be in a children’s size 10 pants again! Very little alterations needed.
My day started on a good note. I had just purchased a black minivan with an automatic ramp that I could get into with my new silver powered wheelchair. I use this chair for long distances as well as crutches for shorter walks.
The chair is ideal for shopping for two reasons; one, I can go fast and two; people can hear me coming because I have a horn! Yes! Black Beauty and the Silver Bullet are going to make my shopping life easier. So I thought.
After arriving at the mall, I gave myself a pep talk; I was ready to take on the world of the pants department.
I wheeled into the store full speed, not knowing that I would be embarking on a trek of great proportions. There was no going back! My credit card was at the ready! And I was on the hunt. Get out of my way! I have a horn and I know how to use it!
The pants department was right in front of me! Pants everywhere! Of course, they were way above my head, since most clothes racks today are 9-foot high. You know the ones you need to use a 6-foot hook to reach that perfect item
Luckily, Silver Bullet has a hydraulic lift that can raise me up to 4 foot 2 inches! This is ideal if you are looking on average clothes racks. Unfortunately, not high enough for the 9-foot ones.
Thank goodness, there were pants on the lower racks. This is where crutches come in handy; you can use them to push things off a shelf or a rack. I have become proficient in lifting items off the racks by balancing them on my crutches. I still have to work on getting things off shelves.
I finally grabbed a pair of pants with my crutches. Unfortunately, as I was pulling them off the rack I accidentally hit my wheelchair control lever and backed into the racks behind me. knocking down numerous pairs of pants. I proceeded to run over the pants a few more times.
The pants I ran over did not have tire marks, so I just picked them up and shoved them under the rack and continued my quest for more pants.
Suddenly I heard a noise coming from the back of my chair. When I looked back to see what the swishing sound was, I noticed I was also dragging a parade of pants. Thankfully, a helpful shopper stopped and removed the attached pile of pants, also shoving them under a nearby rack!
Oh no my purse! My crutches where are they? I must have lost them in the rack fiasco! Now I had to retrace my steps and find them with the hopes that my stuff was still there. I sure could have used a GPS tracking devise. I backtracked and luckily found both my purse and crutches untouched.
Now I had to figure out where could I put the pants so they wouldn‘t drag on the ground? The only logical place was around my neck! I was determined to get these pants; they were on sale for crying out loud! There were more pants on sale, and I was going to get as many as I could carry.
I ended up with seven pairs of pants, draped around my neck, over my shoulders and on my lap, while still holding my purse and crutches. There has to be a category in some record keeping book for the most pants carried at one time by a 3 foot 2 inch tall person. If not, I think I should start one.
I knew I had to find a better way to store my stuff because it was just a matter of time that a renegade pant leg was going to be caught in the spokes of my wheelchair and I would probably choke myself.
I went to the nearest cashier for help. I asked if she could give me a bag to put the pants in. She gave me a huge cloth and mesh bag that was bigger than me. I told her thank you, kept the pants around my neck and went off to the women’s dressing room.
The decisive moment was near; will any of these pants fit? Will I be lucky enough to get a handicap accessible dressing room? The exhilaration I felt earlier in the day was now dissipating fast.
The disabled dressing room was now a storage room, so I had to use a standard one.
Do not ask me how I did it, I actually managed to get my wheelchair in the room, and close the door. This maneuver occurred without destroying store property.
I only hit the wall once, OK, twice, but there were no dents! This made me proud since I cannot even parallel park if my life depended on it. The laws of physics did not apply in that dressing room that day!
Now, there was no going back! The time had come to try on the pants. For average size people trying on pants is easy, slip one leg on at a time and voila! Not so when your three foot 2 inches tall! A whopping 38 inches, gee! All of my pants were taller than me!
Necessity is the mother of invention, and little people should get the Nobel Prize in figuring out how to do every day tasks in unordinary ways. We can get from point A to B but sometimes we have to take the long way to point C to get back to B.
However, doing things in an unconventional way is second nature to dwarves, since we have always lived in an environment designed for average size people.
The fun now begins! I get out of my chair, stand up with my crutches, and plop all the pants down on the bench. Since the bench was too high for me, I had to do the proverbial heave hoe and hop up.
Now the big decision, should I roll up each pant leg to make it easier to put them on? Or, leave them long? I did neither; I just put them on and bunched them up until I could see my feet.
The first pair didn’t fit, which was not that disappointing since they were the ones that the color was not to my liking.
However, I did manage to have six pair fit. It was going to be a good day after all! Six out of 7 pairs of pants is an above average conquest for me. It’s like scoring a perfect 10! All of the elements in the universe came together to form a cosmic perfect fit.
After finally getting dressed and ready to leave, I felt like I had just completed a marathon. I had been shopping for 5 hours, I was tired but happy for completing the journey.
Oh no! I was trapped! The dressing room door was stuck. Will I be a victim of a defective door? I still had life to live, more shopping to do, and maybe, just maybe, someday I could actually learn to parallel park!
I banged on the door and yelled, “I’m stuck in the dressing room” No one was out there, I yelled and banged on the door for what seemed like an eternity, actually it was only 10 minutes, until someone finally came to liberate me.
Thank goodness! Free to shop another day, happy that my quest ended on a good note. I left the store with my prize, one that I worked hard for and was proud I could achieve.
Nothing would ever be out of my reach, except for the 9-foot clothes racks and they are no longer scary to me because size is not something to fear. Being 3 foot 2 inches tall is not a hinderance if you can deal with your challenges with an open mind.
Never be afraid to try something out of the ordinary to reach your goal.
My next expedition will be shopping for six new blouses to go with my new pants.
I hear the internet is a great way to shop, no 9-foot racks to deal with and the dressing rooms have a lot of space! Sounds like a plan!
Share your shopping adventures! Email us at nathasha@audacitymagazine.com .