Yesterday I went shopping with my mom in St-Bruno for her birthday, and we ran into
Georges Laraque at a cosmetics store. The man was until recently the leader of Canada's Green Party, and before that he was a NHL player signed on to various teams in large part because of his size and enforcer disposition. I look at him, ask my mother "wait, am I taller than he is?", and she's like, "um, yeah, by a little bit". So, that weirded me out pretty hard for some reason. Of course the guy easily has like 90+ pounds more muscle than I do so my general bulk doesn't come close, but still.
I think it's a factor of... Well, intellectually I know I'm tall, but being given the opportunity to compare, it's like my brain suddenly goes "holy shit, I'm bigger than that, holy fuck, I must be TERRIFYING, because I sure feel terrified by myself right now". It's kinda trippy. In a way it makes me glad I'm so mild-mannered, because I'll be damned if this world needs one more asshole of my size.
On the other hand, when I do meet people taller than I am, my first thought is always "I wonder if I could take them in a fight", so who knows, maybe the real blessing is that I'm not actually a short guy.