I’m walking on a residential section of Massachusetts Avenue, where unimpeded cars and buses speed on through to the next strip of commerce. My umbrella is pitched forward to protect my face from the wind-driven rain. I am thinking about a map in a recent New York Times that illustrated national population trends. There were prominent arrows pointing from the Northeast to places like Florida, Texas and Arizona. Every ten feet, my umbrella throttles a wind gust.
A voice breaks my pensiveness. “Excuse me, can I ask you a question?” A short older woman with a nest of bright orange hair and matching eyebrows darts over to me. She wears a thick wool coat and nothing to protect her from the rainstorm.
She’s going to ask me for money, I thought, but I stopped and turned to face her, positioning the umbrella accordingly. “Sure.”
“Have you heard about the postal service’s new rule?” she asked while mopping her forehead with her coat sleeve.
She’s crazy, I thought. “What do you mean?”
The woman walked over to a nearby USPS blue mailbox and pointed to a decal on the top that explained the 13-ounce weight restriction. “It says that stamped mail that weighs over 13 ounces cannot be mailed here. It says it’s a new rule.”
“Yes,” I said.
“So can I mail it here or not?” She pulled a thin envelope out of her pocket. Literally half of the envelope was covered in stamps.
She’s joking? “You can mail that. It’s not over 13 ounces.”
She turned to the collection box again and began reading the notice aloud. “Attention, new 13-ounce rule…”
“How much postage did you put on it?” I interrupted, and she looked at me blankly. “Do all of those stamps total 41 cents?”
“Yes, yes,” she said. Silly question. “But it says…”
“You can mail it here,” I said. “Definitely. It’s not over 13 ounces.”
“Oh, okay,” she said. “I just wanted to make sure I’m doing the right thing, cause it’s a new rule.”
“It’ll work,” I promised, and she dropped it in the box, thanked me, and scampered away. I couldn’t suppress one last judgment on the poor woman:
She’s as dim as the sky during a rainy Friday afternoon.
