Tax Man

Tonight at 6:00, I met with a charming man with an MBA on his wall. He took the planner he'd emailed me that I printed and filled out (which he makes easy to do as long as you keep the tax papers that arrive in the mail) along with a few pieces of paper from me. He made small talk as he typed, asking about the B while his wife chided me from the outer office for not bringing her with me.

(Mind you, I'd only been there once before, about a year ago, to have our taxes done last year. They are smart businesspeople, to have such information at their fingertips, the sort of stuff that makes people feel at home there.)

After a story about his four year-old grandson, I heard the printer start printing. He got up, telling me that the B would grow up faster that I could imagine, and came back with our completed tax forms. He got us what I'm sure is the largest amount we could possibly be entitled to on the up-and-up back as a refund. He continued the small talk as he used two self-inking stamps to address my federal and state return envelopes, then went nuts with a stapler, attaching the mister's W-2 to both.

I glanced at the clock on his wall. It said 6:12. I was already writing out his check, and he told me the fee amount as he handed over the envelopes to me. It was an embarrassingly tiny percentage of the money he'd just gotten us back on our taxes. I filled the figure in on the check and handed it over to him.

He shook my hand and we got up, moving back to the outer office, where I was made to promise that the baby would come with me the next time.

Holy frickin' heck, I love finding a place where I know I'm getting a good deal, where I feel better leaving the joint than I did when I walked in. I was stressing hard about the taxes last year when I found this place. I stressed again this year that it would be an awful ordeal, even though this place worked out so well last year.

I am so glad to have been wrong. One weight, gone from my shoulders.