FINANCES AND INCOME TAX

        Are you a list maker? I am and I just made a list of important work I need to get done tvery soon. (1) I need to prepare my 2019 income taxes; (2) I need to complete the form requesting my property taxes be reduced and submit it; (3) I need to go online and update my medical file for the physical exam I scheduled for March. These are the big three and in addition to the ordinary stuff that’s always on the list, i.e., laundry, vacuum, dust, grocery shop, etc., etc., etc.

          The first item on the list tend is an annual event that has pissed me off and annoyed the heck out of me for decades. That’s because I didn’t want to have to do any of the money stuff in my marriage. I simply wanted and expected a husband that would go to work, come home, pay the bills and take care of any pesky financial stuff that came up, like assuring our golden years would be debt free and fun.

          Silly me, drunk with Cinderella Syndrome back in the late 1960s, I expected John to work at a job for all our married life while I took on the part of Mrs. “Cleaver” Karlberg. I’d keep a beautiful home, cook wonderful meals and raise brilliant happy beautiful children.

Those expectations did work out from the get go…I should have run screaming into the night right after the honeymoon when John suggested we each keep our own checking accounts. So, that’s what we did for all our years of marriage although we each had our name on the other’s account. As a matter of fact, I have a check to deposit because I just closed John’s account at his bank…no, we didn’t even have the same bank.            

          I almost always had at least a half-time job and eventually came to earn far more than John, only because he had his own business and didn’t pay himself well at all. According to John, it cost too much in taxes for him to have much of an income. So, the bulk of budgeting, paying bills, doing the paperwork and filing taxes for John’s company, as well as taxes for us personally fell to me.

          I’m not exactly sure why it developed in this manner. I know we did try to reverse the situation more than once. I’m not a genius when it comes to math, but it was somehow easier for me take care of our financial business. And, I suppose it was actually a good thing because it was me paying into the retirement system that allowed us/me to retire and continue to pay the bills each month. John’s “costs too much to pay into social security” netted him less than half of what I receive.

          This year I don’t have anyone to grumble to or at when I begin dragging all the papers from the files. I also won’t need an additional signature when it comes time to submit anything. Somehow knowing I’ll be signing everything as just me, myself and I, makes John’s absence seem, once again, more infinite. It truly makes me wonder how it will be in 2021. Will I still become pissed off and annoyed when it comes time to fill out the tax forms? Or, will I simply sail through it because it’s just me, myself and I?