Two most certain and dreadful events: the death of my mother at the end of last November and the due date for tax returns, rapidly approaching. I will have to continue her story after I complete the latter. Thank you for hanging in there with me.
I can better relate to this variation on that line attributed to Ben Franklin and others:
“Death, taxes and childbirth! There’s never any convenient time for any of them.” –Margaret Mitchell, in Gone with the Wind
I’m feeling the looming, pressing weight of the tax darkness mashing on me, too. It won’t be pretty. Your chapters are worth any amount of waiting for, by the way. Thank you!
Shu
By: shussmallworld on March 1, 2008
at 8:18 pm
Thanks, Shu! I just got back from visiting our latest grandchild. Somehow a newborn puts life in perspective.
By: blythelight on March 2, 2008
at 10:13 am
And they all suck the life out of you for a time!
By: Jennifer on March 4, 2008
at 1:54 pm
ah yes… taxes… it’s such a happy, er I mean,,, crappy time of the year:-) I actually have less to look forward to this year as my wife and I decided to give up our daughter as an exemption, to her mother. We have been divorced for 16 years now and we all get along very well, so that is no issue here. My daughter is a full time student at college.
It’s really a long story, but my ex wife is remarried but they make a small income and my daughter will most likely get a lot more federal and state aid and loans by living with her mother. The deal is that the primary custodian parent, which is me, can release her as an exemption to her other parent. This is obviously good news for them as not only will they have 3 dependents but due to the government giving the tax incentives after May of this year, they will also get more money due to having her as a dependent.
Well, its good thing for our daughter. In the end, she will have far less loans and lower interest loans to repay when she is done with college, and that’s what’s the most important thing. We all have to do what we can as parents to help make their lives better off than we were.
By: David Lindberg on March 4, 2008
at 4:42 pm
I feel tax time ought to be closer to Halloween, because I feel the blood being sucked right out of me!
We have 4 kids in college or about to start college right now – and although they are all at varying degrees of being independent, they all need a little help here and there, too. It’s not easy.
I got in an interesting philosophical discussion the other day as to whether we, as parents, really should feel obligated to help make our children’s lives better than our own. Personally, I feel how could we not? But there are certain values learned in the struggle. I recently heard on the news that this is the first generation that is worse off than their parents. The war has sunk even the unborn into debt.
Something to think about.
By: blythelight on March 4, 2008
at 9:44 pm