January. I’m not a fan. It’s as far away from the lazy days of summer as it can be, the weather is stinking cold, and the mere mention of the month makes visions of tax forms and pencil stubs dance in my head.
It seems I had no sooner pulled in from a sleigh ride with bells a jing-jing-jingling, ring-ring-ring-ling too and bid our New Year’s guests a hardy adieu, when the Christmas season reduced itself to the bottom of my life screen, and the weight loss and tax people moved in like a virus-induced pop-up and all but took over my hard drive. I’ve got piles on top of my piles. Adding machines, file boxes, year-end reports and the whole shebang. I feel as though I’ve been locked up for days poring over figures and calculations, percentages and deductions, and that’s just to figure out how many pounds I put on in the last month.
This year has been especially frustrating, for no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t get into the tax frame of mind.
I turned down the office lights, spritzed up my desk and played mood-enhancing music.
Nothing.
Talk about taxing feats. Not even a meal replacement bar and a creamlaced cup of coffee could inspire me.
Some days I’d force myself to sit at the desk and at least start shuffling through the files. But then the phone would ring and I’d snatch the portable from its cradle and race from the office faster than you can say procrastination.
I visited at length with my mother, chatted it up with my brother, and once talked to a telemarketer for so long that we’re now Facebook friends.
I didn’t stop there, no sir. I invited over acquaintances, offered to run extra errands for my sister, and once wasted an afternoon paying homage to gel pens at the local super center.
All under the guise of getting in the tax mood.
But I’m an adult, and as such, I realized I had to take the adding machine by the buttons and face the tasks at hand.
Yesterday I donned a pair of sweat pants, slipped on my fuzzy slippers and for extra inspiration, I stuck a pencil behind my ear.
What I lacked in fashion, I more than made up for with comfort.
Thanks to QuickBooks and its fun-loving reports, I quickly had most of the computations that I needed and yet nuttin’ says lovin’ like realizing that you don’t have all of the proper tax forms on hand.
I guess it can’t all be wine and roses
I made a trip to the IRS, served my time in a fun yet taxing line, and eventually retrieved all of the necessary forms with ease.
Then I raced back to the home office before I was out of my accounting mood and commenced to print like it was my job.
The printer ate the first batch of forms, bad alignment made the second group dance right off the page, and although set number three was nothing short of stellar, it had no less than six errors and required reprinting.
I tell you, it was enough to make a preacher cuss.
Back to the IRS I went, sporting less than a smile and had certainly lost the spring in my step. I wasn’t sure if there was a limit as to how many 1099s your average taxpayer is allotted, but last Friday was not the day that I wanted to find out.
I waited my turn and when my time came, I put my head down in hopes that they wouldn’t recognize me and said in a low voice, “I’ll take six 1099s and two 1096s please.”
Again, I raced back home and promptly fed my hungry printer, which enjoyed the fourth batch of forms as much as the first.
I bopped the dang thing alongside its carriage and called it a dirty so-and-so before powering it down for the weekend.
As I write, I’m pondering my attire for my third visit to the IRS offices. I may need to add a stocking cap to my ensemble, perhaps replace the pencil with a stylish pair of reading glasses and round out the look with a nametag that says “Mabel.”
Hopefully I’ll make a clean getaway, the printer will play nicely with the forms and we can finally close the books on January and open the ledger on February.
Perhaps I’m being overly optimistic and my hopes will crumple like copy C of a W2 in a persnickety printer.
Now, wouldn’t that just figure?
Lori Clinch is the mother of four sons and the author of the book “Are We There Yet?” You can reach her at [email protected].