Musician’s Widow

You’d think I’d be doing a major happy dance to see tax season come to an end. And I am!

But I admit, it also comes with a tinge of sadness, too. There’s always things left that I didn’t get to do during my time in Texas for tax season. And I do so enjoy having so much time with family. I love my parents. I adore my niece and nephew. And there just never seems to be enough down time to spend with all of them.

This tax season was one that I was really the most healthy! No major sinus infections for a change, and I got the tooth ache thing over with early. It was nice to not be miserable for chunks of time. (And it was quite telling how many clients came in and commented that I felt so good for a change!)

It was also one of the craziest work-wise. It was the first season that as April 15th drew near I started to feel panicked that we weren’t going to make it. In fact April 15th is usually a pretty relaxed day at the office. Last minute pick-ups are about all we deal with. Today we were battling computers, lists, double checking the lists, getting things done… it wasn’t awful, but it also wasn’t as relaxed as usual.

But, its done. It’s in the books. Now on to the long list of extensions we filed. Now on to normal life again. Back to Nashville soon. Back to the bar and back to more focus on this blog and photography.

I look forward to good things this year… and I’m excited for it! But… I AM a little sad, too. And for now I think that just means all is right in the world, and that I am happy wherever I am and it means that I am also always sad to leave no matter what.

I am generally an optimistic person. But as I sit here and write this blog, I’m over people in general.

“Over it!” one of my fellow bartenders and I sometimes shouted to each other last night as we dashed by each other, overwhelmed by the sheer volume of people. No. Wait. Let me clarify. Sheer volume of IMPATIENT people.

I can handle a busy bar. I actually relish it and enjoy the interaction and the fast pace. Often busy night are nights I feel most “on my game.” Makes the night go by fast as well, and it usually leaves me very happy with my pocketbook at the end of the night.

But what leaves me overwhelmed and hating people for days following a rough night is when people are impatient and rude about it. When they put on blinders and decide THEY are the queen or king of the bar and if you don’t serve them in two seconds you’re a worthless bartender. And that… hurts. Because we’re working as fast as we can, haven’t had a pee break in hours, nor had a second to take a sip of water, generally are sweating like crazy from running ourselves so hard… and still nothing we do will ever be right. I had more than a few moments last night that I wanted to just stop running and have a good cry.

See some of my bar tips for customers from a bartender’s perspective.

I suppose such a thing can happen in any job, and that’s why I TRY to give people I interact with in various scenarios the benefit of the doubt.

Just tonight, my husband got very frustrated when two people at the local McDonalds couldn’t figure out our change correctly, and I finally had to correct them to get the show on the road. I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt… they don’t teach how to count back change any more in schools, and even I have my  nights where I need to take a tab to the register to get the amount right that they owe. I told him I blame management as well for not ensuring their employees can think through a transaction versus being just drones that punch buttons on a keypad. (I make similar rants about sackers at grocery stores who put bleach with my fruit.)

But at the end of the day, I have to agree with him that some things are simply being a good employee. Some things are about wanting to work your way up the ladder of success versus just drawing a paycheck. Or in the same breath (and on the flip side) its simply being a good customer and realizing when it’s your turn you’ll be treated like the only customer… but only after you let the other guy get the same treatment.

It goes BOTH ways.

So tonight… having been on both sides of a rough business transaction in the last two days, I’m just done. Done with people. Done with business. Done.

Can someone bring me a shot?

Tonight is the biggest Christmas party we host at the bar each year. This is my third or fourth time to work it… and its crazy busy.

I joke that there is fear in my eyes when I talk about it. It’s full throttle all night long, often finding the bar three or four deep all yelling for drinks. Its stressful!!

But its also exhilarating. Its rewarding. And it flies by — it is over almost as fast as it begins. You don’t have time to think about the time. You don’t have time to think about much of anything except the order in front of you.

Bring it on… I’m ready. I have a 5 Hour in my purse. Tennis shoes are ready to rock. Bottle opener primed to go.

Let’s do this!

October went by crazy fast for me. I was just BUSY, and as we jump into November with both feet I’m still busy!

Last month, it was busy downtown. I picked up a lot of nights in the bar — something that paid off really well, and I am SO grateful for that fact. It’s left me on a total vampire schedule (I just can’t flip flop like most people!), but its also left me feeling very satisfied with the feeling of hard work done well.

Now, though, my workload is completely different. I have a lot of stuff I need to handle for my parent’s business — research in products and stuff. I have a CD cover to design, like, yesterday. I have a friend looking to start a blog and wants me to help him with the design of it. I am trying to do NaNoWriMo. And I’m just looking to enjoy my birthday month and Thanksgiving!

BUSY! That is me.

And I plan to love every moment of it.

A big reason why I want to make writing and photography happen for me as a career (outside of a sheer love and passion for them) is that I love the personal flexibility it provides me. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I know I have to stay focused and on-task to be successful. However, I like being able to be at home when my husband is home.

Right now its touring season, and my husband is on the road more than he’s at home. A fact we are both extremely thankful for, and a fact I strive to work around as much as possible. On his few days at home, I want to be able to move my projects around to step away from the computer and sit on the front step with him watching fireflies, listening to the high school band in the distance.

I like to sleep later than usual, when he’s at home. My rush to get up and start the day disappears for a few days. I’d rather snuggle down and stay where he is for another hour… or two. If he has a meeting to be at, I like to tag along… even if I just sit in the car and people watch, waiting for him to come out.

In the same breath, even when he’s tired from the road and wants to go to bed “early,” he’ll push forward awhile so we can go to bed at the same time. If I have a meeting of my own, he too tags along. He’s always game to any hair-brained idea I may have for us to go do, “Just to get out of the house for awhile.”

We strive hard to coordinate our schedules when we are both at home, knowing the hours together are precious before I’m dropping him back off at the bus to head to another show in another state.

Sometimes… sometimes we aren’t too successful. Take tonight, as I write this. I am trying to keep my schedule a bit “off” for upcoming nights working downtown in a bar. My husband, however, has a session bright and early in the morning. So in an odd move, he went to bed hours ago while I sit doing some work on the computer. In the morning, he’ll get up and head into town, while I snuggle back down under the covers for a few more hours of sleep.

As always, we are thankful for the work. Oh, once in a blue moon, I get a little grumbly, wanting more time together than working, but it never lasts too long. I quickly remember that work is what we prayed to get, and work is what we are thankful to have. We make the most of our time together, and I aim to continue to be able to do that. I don’t want to be ships passing in the night, if I can at all help it.

We survived another tax season. Every year, my parents and I say at least once twice a few dozen times, “This year is going to be the death of me!” That’s the stress talking. We aren’t being literal.

We hope.

Every year, we find new ways to make the process smoother, just as the government finds ways to complicate things. You can claim that this year, but not next year. You can itemize this but not that. You get this credit but only if you stand on your head and drink water while saying the alphabet backwards.

You think I’m kidding? I swear that one is in the tax code somewhere. If it isn’t, it should be. If for no other reason that to give tax preparers something to laugh about as they wade through the idiosyncrasies of the tax code.

What makes the job so stressful is the fact that you’re dealing with people’s financial outlook. Mistakes can cost your client thousands of dollars and can even land a huge fine (or worse!) on the tax preparer. We strive to do the job RIGHT. No law bending or “personal interpretation” being done here!

So, within that, I present to you my tax season pet peeves for 2011 (in no particular order):

• Please don’t wait until the last minute to bring in your tax work and discover you have items missing… then STILL expect the return done by deadline. Let me introduce you to Mr. Extension. He will be taking care of you this trip, and we’ll attack your lack of information sometime AFTER deadline.
• We aren’t mind readers. We don’t sit with a crystal ball to consult on every return. Did you have a child this year? Did you get married? Divorced? Move? Go self-employed? Buy stocks? Did your nephew come to live with you for the year? These are all things we NEED to know to properly do your return. Just because your baby’s birth announcement ran in the newspaper back in July of last year doesn’t mean we saw it. Help us out here. (And when we DO ask, don’t get snippy with us. Just give us the information… please?)
• The old idea of throwing your receipts in a shoe box for your preparer to wade through is just not happening these days. Either wade through them yourself and put them in some sort of order or be prepared to be charged extra for the extra work/stress you’ve brought to our office. Or, you know, meet Mr. Extension.
• Bigger and better refunds than the competition! Bull corn. If you’re going to get a refund its based on tax codes and how everything falls together on your return. If you owe, it doesn’t mean WE (the preparer) screwed up. It just means you owe money. When a software or tax company promises you bigger refunds than the competition, it doesn’t mean they have this magic dust they sprinkle on the paper to make it appear. It just means its a gimmick to get you in the door.
• Please don’t try to get us to lower our fees. I had a whole blog post on this earlier this year. See it for more on THAT whole rant of mine.
• If we take a message instead of patch you through to the preparer you wish to speak with, its not because we don’t love you anymore. Its because they are doing a return and need to focus to do the job right. You get mad if we make a mistake (and we’re human, so it happens), but you have to understand that often mistakes occur due to constant interruption while the work is being done. We might not take you call because we DO love you. See?
• If you feel like I might be treating you like a 5th grader, its because I’ve found its just a good rule of thumb. It never fails that when I assume someone already knows where to sign, etc… they don’t. So its just easier to assume you DON’T know and risk offending you than it is to assume you DO know and then get us ALL in a heap of trouble.
• We have over 400 clients. Yes, over half of you have been coming to us for 5 – 10 years (or longer). Still… help me out with your name when you come in to pick up your return or if you want to see someone. It’s not that I don’t love you, its that sometimes I just haven’t had enough coffee to put a name to a face. Some days, there just isn’t enough coffee in the world. Feel free, in that moment, to treat ME like a fifth grader. I won’t mind. I promise.
• If I give you that deer in the headlight look its because you just asked me something I can’t answer. I figure you know that, but, hey, sometimes people reword the question thinking maybe I’ll know the answer if they do that. Nope. I still don’t know the answer, and now you’ve made me feel dumb twice. Give me a moment to find someone who CAN answer the question. Thanks.
• Please don’t ask us to bend the rules. We won’t. And when we refuse, don’t get angry. We’re telling you no for your own good. Kinda like the time your Mom said you couldn’t have that candy bar before supper, because she knew if you ate it you wouldn’t want that yummy pizza she was making. Remember? Yeah, kinda like that. Only we are saying you can’t fudge the rules because we don’t want anyone to go to jail, nor anyone pay a huge fine and yucky stuff like that. We’re licensed professionals. We do things by the book.
• Finally, please don’t ask me to discuss politics. Not only do I just not want to go there, but with the work we’re doing, it just isn’t appropriate. I’m so glad you’re so passionate about it, but please don’t ask me to jump on your bandwagon for the sake of making you happy. Lets do the work at hand and move on from there.

Oh I’m sure I have plenty more little things that either made me cover my face or beat my head on the desk over the last few months, but I figure these suffice.

Ah. We did it. Another season in the books. A lot of extensions to do in the coming weeks/months, but we’re always grateful for that as well. Thankful for another successful season, and thankful for the loyalty of our clients. Without them, we’d be nowhere. So even as I have my little pet peeves, at the end of the day… I don’t really mind. It keeps things interesting at least.