Gotcha! Those who hastily assumed that the thrust of this article would be on tight shoes, pants, underwear or condoms will be sorely disappointed. For while tight shoes and oversized condoms, big heads and baggy pants will be mentioned, “Wear your size” is a simple metaphor that seeks to encourage us to understand our limitations, strengths and weaknesses before biting off more than we can chew.

In other words, and as explicitly suggested in this slightly modified Jamaican proverb, “Goat must know the size of its behind before it swallows hog plum (Prunus umbellata)”. Supplementally, one must understand the “ding-dong” relationship between actions and reactions. Nevertheless, knowing one’s limitations should never become the premise on which to stunt one’s own growth and it certainly ought not to become the reason for imprisoning one’s ambitions.

There are countless stories about people moving from rags to riches, and there are innumerable motivational accounts of students who, even at the nine-grade level, could not construct a sentence let alone spell “bull”, overcame great odds and went on to achieve greatness. However, in some of these cases of triumph, there have been several rivets that hold ambition, drive and action together, without which success would remain fleeting.

Some of these rivets include determination, common sense, luck, clarity of mission, focus, hard and smart work, commitment to task, seizing the moment, humility and community, personal responsibility, respect, and self-less opportunism. Even so, some may ask, what is the relevance of “Wear your size” to the body of the article, if there is no intention to amplify Lieutenant Stitchie’s’ famous Wear Yuh Size dancehall song?

Well, except for its use as a metaphor, the title is intended to inspire others to seize the moment to measure up to their potential. There are countless stories about how underestimating or overestimating one’s abilities could prove beneficial or counterintuitive to one’s objectives, because private decisions about one’s future could affect millions who were never party to an original action. Similarly, there are issues that arise from certain private decisions that ultimately create opportunities for advancement and enlightenment.

That aside and back to “Wear your size”. Besides the unbearable podiatric discomfort that mostly women suffer, wearing tight shoes is comparable to the embarrassing frustration some East Asia men face sourcing small enough condoms to fit their package. Many of us must be grateful for our endowment from our ancestral antecedents; we do not have to contend with finding small enough condoms.

One would have expected the East Asians, with their extraordinary ability to exploit science, to design a stretch-to-fit product. But as bad luck would have it, not wearing one’s size could also produce unintended consequences, as bigger condom sizes are definitely too slack for smaller tools to prevent semen from floating into areas that it should avoid, particularly if multiplication is not on the intimacy agenda. Therefore, unplanned pregnancies usually happen when someone either did not wear his size or wore nothing at all. Furthermore, unplanned pregnancies are linked to many social ills associated with children growing up without the benefit of strong parental support and involvement.

There are times in our lives when we experience, or act upon the feeling of invincibility. We feel so emboldened by the feeling of adventure that if we are not careful we would attempt to move mountains, however foolhardy. Take as an example entering certain financial arrangements about which one is either unprepared, or uninformed.

There are also enough cases of people listening to call-in radio shows about house buying, but do not understand the ramifications involved in buying a house or in maintaining a mortgage. Yet, they jump – feet first – into the deep blue sea, only to encounter dangerous currents midway from which they cannot escape. Wearing your size would have made the greatest sense, had some time been spent weighing the pros and cons.

Then, there are others who will not wear their size. They are like guys who wear baggy pants which keep falling to the ankle while threatening to trip them over. These are the types who are so convinced by their own craziness that they fight tooth and nail to land that coveted position, only to prove their incompetence. And they usually have no idea about the requirements of the job, or about how ill-prepared, professionally and otherwise, they are to assume the position they so gallantly fought to obtain. These are the individuals we refer to when we say “a little knowledge can be dangerous”. Sometimes, they learn new words or phrases, and are so in love with the newfound knowledge that they become slaves to malapropism and an eternity of embarrassment.

This brings me to an incident that happened many years ago while I was high school. A few of my classmates decided to “horse around” in the middle of morning devotion. Unknown to them, Ms Richards, our literature teacher, was keenly observing their antics and decided to reprimand them. She stoutly reminded them: “One’s head must always be proportional to the rest of one’s body, or else the neck will give way and would never manage to carry it. Proportionality is essential and you guys have absolutely no sense of proportion.”

Well, Terrence had to say something silly and since he was the spokesman for the group, he wasted no time to prove his bona fides. “Miss Richards,” he ruefully intoned, “it all depends on which head you are talking about. The neck carries only one head ma’am”. We laughed because this masterful retort obviously confounded Ms Richards, who had become quite indignant and animated. “So how many heads you have?” She asked, as Terrence look towards his feet. He uttered not a word, but offered the “V” sign to indicate he had two heads. Poor Miss Richard could not help advising, “Well, Terrence, you need to learn to wear your size, even though it is clear your two heads are shamefully inadequate”.

Burnscg@aol.com