I'll regret this eventually, but until then...ya'll only live once~
Lorax (c) Respective Ownerships and whatnot
The Once-ler had always been tall. As far back as he could recall he'd always been much like the beanpole he found himself likened to by a certain meatloaf of a creature.
There was when he was born, a whopping sixty-three centimeters of wriggling pink wails and an exhausted mother to attest to the labor of his birth. She hadn't ever really forgiven him for that trouble, if the fact the woman brought it up at any mention of any baby ever had something to say of it.
He'd never grown into himself, not really. Once-ler had always been the child forced to stand in the far, far back of the group during the class photo in his schooling years. Always the not-so-little boy with the knobby knees and the spindly fingers that would twist and twine, eager for some sort of purpose they could not find. They gave him games to play, but he wasn't much for athletics—not so much a well-balanced flamingo as an ostrich that had somehow found its was into the tallest mountain peaks. He'd had knitting needles between his fingers when the other boys had marbles. Aiming the little orbs properly had always been something of a challenge. He lost his nerve to ever play again after he'd somehow flicked that one "ade" into Bobby's eye. Bret and Chet never told him about the tourneys, not after that.
His uncle gave him an ax when he was twelve. He begged for another axe when he was fifteen. The girls liked a guy who could play music, sure. However, they weren't so much into the gawky teen who lived in a home that never stayed and did not have a dollar to his name.
He'd had ideas, after that.
By the time he had one thousand ideas for one little cloth, he was on the road. It was a wonder in his eyes how he was still a sunflower in a bed of roses, even then. How, even when it was just him, Melvin, and that creaky, old wagon traversing atop flat tundra (or a desert, or a beach), he still felt out horribly out of place.
What ended up being both the most exhilarating and terrifying sensation all at once was when he found somewhere that he did fit. It was a somewhere with cotton candy blue waters and towering trees with hues to match sorbet.
Once-ler stopped growing after that.
There was a town, but he didn't often go there, not until the cloth of a thousand ideas was ready. He was too tall those times, but at least he had his somewhere to go back to. Even if that place had a walking-talking pain in the neck (he liked him some, really) that barely reached his knees, he still felt right.
It felt even better when he got bigger.
Taller was overrated. Being taller hadn't gotten him anywhere. But being bigger, oh being bigger was something else entirely. Being bigger made those shoulders pull back, made that chin turn up, made that smirk paint his lips. He could do anything during that time when he was bigger. When he was bigger, he could say anything he wanted, wear anything he wanted, be anything he wanted. Repercussions were for the small, and the meek, and the unsuccessful.
Once-ler was glad he never grew any taller, after that. And in time, bigger proved to be little better either.
Bigger was temporary. Bigger was the fleeting want of thousands, all pining for that one shining concept that captured their flickering eyes for that brief phase of their existences. Bigger was doomed to fail from the start.
When he was tall, his shadow was long-rail thin-but never changed the verdant hue of green grasses underfoot. When he was big, the darkness eclipsed and consumed anything that had the misfortune to fall under it. Reason never saw the sunlight, and so shriveled up like everything else Bigger massacred.
Once-ler, for the first time, felt small.
It would be a long time afterwards that he would finally see that size didn't matter.
