Hers & His Blog Anniversary: A Taxing Experience

Being a giant fan of anniversaries, I rarely pass on the opportunity to commemorate any moment. Like the time Zane and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary of our first kiss, this time without that pesky girlfriend of his in the picture. Or when I made a cake to commemorate a month of Zane having put his clothes away. So I won’t be the one to drop the ball and not take note that today is our one year anniversary of our blog. A full year already?! You betcha. That means Zane and I have been living in sin for what feels like a lifetime. We’ve had highs and lows, but we’ve prevailed. Through 4 moves (since the blog, but 6 total since knowing each other) we’ve always found the humor amidst the tears.

It was just one year ago today that Julie and I sat down to write an email detailing all the daily news about our wild and crazy lives together. We were constantly being pestered (or "pleasantly asked" for any of those I'm referring to) about what we've been up to. We didn't want to be jerks and CC our loved ones on generic emails, however we were far too lazy and self-absorbed to actually call everyone repeating our tales like Crunchberry at a corporate meet-and-greet. Instead we took the lazy route and amassed all our stories for a blog. What transpired would go down in relationship history, our relationship history.

Since living together has become so blasé we’ve spiced things up by adding weekly challenges to keep things fresh. Last week Zane fared pretty well being left in the wilderness with nothing but a fork and a can of beans. This week we thought we’d take it to an even scarier level... Taxes.

Since we are both adults who have had full lives before crossing paths, it’s rare to have a first, let alone a first for both of us, that we can experience. So as we grumpily sat across from each other on our laptops, a twinge of sappiness seeped into my bones. Sure, we were filing separately… maybe for the last time? Ha. I took the opportunity to invoke a little friendly competition. As the deductions mounted I excitedly announced each dollar added to my pot. “Ooh! Another $100!” “Wow! Do YOU qualify for that $400??” Somehow my delight didn’t seem to amuse him. So what if he has to pay in since he’s a consultant? He can still be a good sport.

While Julie and I are a very nostalgic couple there is a no more nostalgic bunch than the US Government. "Oh you worked on a small project for a friend and they gave you some money for it? Wow that was nice of them, may I have some of it?" Or even, "have you ever purchased anything online? We'd like to have some money for it as well, I mean it's only right since you're using your duck-shaped foot scrubber in OUR state."

Never have I felt more abused in my life, well maybe not since last night when Julie pushed me off the bed. The US government is like that nagging roommate that who is the ultimate mooch. "Hey what you got there? Is that honey? Mind if I have some of it? It's cool I'll buy honey next time." However they don't get the good honey, the primo honey, they get the fake store-brand stuff. I don't mean to sound bitter at the US, I mean they did just win 37 medals at the olympics so that must count for something. Does it?

Being unable to sit still for lengthy periods of time, we rewarded ourselves with shoveling out the car. That’s right, our delightful break from our painful chore was to chip a 2 foot mound of ice and snow from barricading the car. It didn’t take nearly as long as I’d hoped, Zane is quite handy with a shovel. So then it was back to government.

I felt that doing taxes online somewhat cheapened the experience. Not in the preferred way of leaving me with more money to spend at the OTB. Doing taxes online takes away from all those personal touches I had planned to make growing up. For questions I'd like to fudge, I'd switch to my favorite turquoise crayon: Method of Payment - Cash [] Accruement []DelicioUs CHicken [X]. No, I was forced to play by their rules, the man's rules. How are they supposed to think that I am a man desperately in need of money? They only give me so many opportunities to write "You best not be referring to MY money" or "that's really none of your business". Not to mention doodles are COMPLETELY out of the question.

Hours of crazy questions and learning a new language have left me questioning everything:
*Do I suffer from accelerated depreciation?
*Why do they keep insulting my income and calling it gross?
*Is there any way to claim Zane as my adoptive child?
*Why do they ask me 20 times if I’m blind? Should I be? Is this beneficial? How would I be able to read that question online anyway? Trick question?
*Is this one of those instances of “When in doubt, choose C”?
*Is personal interest the same thing as self esteem?

After guessing my way through hours of deeply invasive and intense questioning, I told Zane to stop it and that I must get back to my taxes. They didn’t take as long as I expected and warranted an expressive victory lap around the living room and immediate “I did it!” call to my mom. Zane’s got a little ways to go, but he’s done a great job defining himself as a man to the IRS. I am still trying to figure out why it’s okay for the IRS to ask where this relationship is going, whether he’s single or married, but when I ask that it causes a ruckus. Maybe next year I can start calling Zane my “write off” but I think we’re a long ways away. For now, I’m basking in our joint success in doing something so adult while still being in our jammies.