You know how, early in relationships, you divvy up the Needful Things and everyone gets jobs they like, and jobs they don’t? I somehow got voted as the Most Likely to Get our Taxes Done. I don’t know how that happened. I struggle with equations that contain greater than or less than symbols. So if the alligators mouth is facing the bigger thing, but you’re comparing Lego and apple pies, how does that even work?

Wow, I digressed hard there… even for me.

So armed with the Most Likely to Get Our Taxes Done needful thing, I’ve managed to get our taxes done. More or less successfully. For the last 21 Aprils (*and sometimes by April, I mean 6 months later in October, but I digress again). Most people don’t know this, but there is a formula to how one gets their taxes done. It goes something like this:

Within the first 20 minutes of effort:

• 0-10 DEFCON-1 curse words, or 3 DEFCON-2/3 curse words: Leave the room for at least 20 minutes and try again.
• 15+ DEFCON-1 curse words, or 5 DEFCON-3 (or higher) curse words: Abort the effort for the day. Live to file another day.
• 6 or more DEFCON-4 curse words, plus 4-9 (for a total of 25 syllables) new, made-up curse words: Pay someone else to do the taxes.

And I’m eleventy thousand percent sure that the quality of the swears has nothing to do with the fact that I’m doing my taxes on the very last day, within hours of the deadline. That’s totally not a thing.

A few years ago, when my Gentleman Associate went back to school and I couldn’t figure out school credits with reference to dependents, I hit the 25 syllable threshold in astonishingly few words. Samuel L Jackson and Dennis Leary both sent me Job Well Done cards. In semi-related news, King Louie of Dogswald seems to understand the DEFCON Curse Word system for Tax Preparation. Even if you mumble, he goes and finds somewhere to hide. He didn’t even try to help me. Good thing Sam and Dennis are looking out for me.

I gotta say, though, full props to you if you just jump right to “Get someone else to do your taxes for you” without invoking the DEFCON Curse Word system for Tax Preparation. One day, we’ll figure out that swears are a non-renewable resource, and then I’ll be madmadmad that I used all mine up trying to figure out if I qualify for the Trillium grant or not, and where the bloody hell I put the information from Line 50.

To more delightful news, though. Last year, Child got a T4 from Revenue Canada, so he wanted to do his taxes. He didn’t make enough to pay income taxes, though, so he didn’t need to file.  *sad trombone*

This year, Child got a T4 from Revenue Canada, so he wanted to do his own taxes. With a pencil and a calculator and willpower. Except this year, I bought tax software. Worst mother ever. But he wanted to do his own taxes, so I sat with him and his T4 and he did his very own taxes. Everyone got money back, and I’m not getting a card from Sam Jackson this year. That feels like progress.

I’m pretty proud of the fact that Child wanted to – and did – his own taxes, the first time he had to file. It’s a big deal to know about credits and how to maximize your return, and Child cannonballed in at 18. I’m not claiming to be an expert by any means, but this feels like a thing that qualifies you to be an adult. Maybe he really really is a Grown-Ass Man.

That can’t be right, can it?