Julia Child's Height Was Not a Handicap  What Women Really Think
June 30 2009 4:38 PM  Julia Child's Height Was Not a Handicap
At every public appearance I make, someone raises his hand and
says something like, "It’s much harder to be a tall woman than a
tall man, right?" This point of view was echoed in the current
issue of The New Yorker : A story about the director Nora Ephron
opens with a quote about being tall from Meryl Streep, who is
playing 6-foot-2 Julia Child in the forthcoming movie Julie &
Julia . "I mean, it's like having club foot ... it was a
handicap of sorts, certainly in the world where she was born,"
Streep says.  Yes, being tall has its challenges. I know, I'm
6-foot-3. But at its heart, the constant struggle of height is
that to be tall is to be public, the constant sense of walking
around with a spotlight on you. There's no place to hide, and
that's genderless. Tall men are every bit as self-conscious as
tall women.  Tall women’s struggles are more subtle. You’re not
aware of this unle