Genetically speaking, I feel like I am a bit of an oddity. I am a true 6’2″ in height (not a Tinder 6’2″, which is more like 5’9″ mind you). So, that’s 190cm of Jensen Beeler, coming at yah.
I mention this because I was reading recently that for humans, something seemingly as basic as height isn’t controlled by a single gene. In fact, there are about 700 genes that factor into how tall we are.
It is a fascinating concept on how the DNA from our parents interacts to make us who we are. For instance, despite my tall stature, my parents are pretty much right in the middle of things: my father was 5’8″ and my mother 5’6″.
I could make a joke about having a tall mailman growing up, but really I get my height from my mother’s father, who was six-foot on the dot. I got his red hair too, which went white when I was a teenager, just like all the rest of the grey-haired Beeler progeny. We must get our hair attributes from a number of genes as well then.
Despite being tall, I have a relatively normal inseam, of 32 inches, which means I make most of my height in my torso. I have broad shoulders too, but like my father, I have short arms (thankfully, not quite as short as his).
I have small feet and hands, so it is size 10 shoes for me (with a high arch), and “small” size gloves in most brands. My head is a large in just about every helmet though, which makes for an interesting bookend on the sizing spectrum.
The point that I am trying to drive home here is that we are all very different people when it comes to our body shapes. There is no simple break down of putting humans into categories like small, medium, and large.
We are more complicated than that…and so should the items we wear.
