This was originally posted on blogger.

Taxes have always seemed like the most absurdly, adulty, agonizing thing you can ever get up to on a Sunday afternoon. The kids are out playing baseball; dogs are playing fetch at a ball game; but the adults are stuck inside with a calculator, pen and pencil.

This year was my first time doing taxes. It feels like some kind of twisted rite of passage: Hello, and welcome to adulthood! Can I see your W2?

That’s the first thing they ask for. W2. W2. W2. Who decided on this name? Magically, everyone’s meant to have one. For most jobs, it’s easy and handed in through the mail. But for my summer internship, for example, the W2 was stored secretly on this magical portal that I registered with my work email which was deactivated and I forgot the password so I could access it so I emailed HR and they actually changed their name to People Ops so the emails didn’t get through and when I finally did get through, they told me to call the portal help desk, which was listed on the website the entire damn time. So then I get talking to this nice woman named Julia – people on these phone lines really appreciate it when you remember their name for the entire five minutes you talk to them – and after she interrogated me about my childhood pet name, she let me have my god damn W2.

So you get all your W2’s in place – the stars are aligned – and that’s not the end of it. It would be nice – and it’s not like this – if filing taxes were like an ATM where you just slide in your documents and bam, they work it all out for you. Not that inconcievable, right? Well, that’s not how it’s done in America. So because it’s a free country they give you like 10 different tax filing services to choose from, and I manage to choose the wrong one that’s way to complicated, and there’s way too many boxes to add up… until I call my dad, an experienced, veteran adult, who tells me I should be using the 1040-EZ instead of the 1040. What a slap in the face.

And that’s when I discover TurboTax. I had heard rumors about this – mainly leftists including myself shitting on its creator, Intuit – but I buckle down and go for TurboTax because the New York Times said I should. And suddenly, TurboTax is there to save the day. There’s like confetti and pats on the back and when things get complicated, they tell me, “Don’t worry. We’re here to make it easy.” and I suddenly realize why Americans look for a strong father figure in government. Daddy TurboTax is here for me with “his” calming voice and helpful how-tos. Truly, what a guy. In the end, TurboTax spits out this form that’s incomprehensible to me – even though I studied economics and multivariable calculus (I was right all along – they don’t teach you anything practical in high school) – and amazingly I’m owed one thousand extra dollars than expected because of the COVID stimulus. I’d like to thank my parents – Mom and Daddy TurboTax – for this accomplishment.

I’ve always had this sense when looking at complicated things from afar that it’s some kind of magic. Going through airport security was one of them. Cooking chana masala. Signing a lease. And finally (but not finally, because more of these will come up), doing taxes. But once you’ve done these things once or twice the magic wears away… and the importance of getting your macronutrients and paying the government money (so we can wage war abroad?) becomes apparent.

Adulting at first glance looks awfully boring. But if you’re willing to sit through paperwork and logistical meetings and bureaucracies – a somewhat big if – then the world is open to you as an adult. As long as you have a floor to sleep on and food in your belly, you can literally do anything you want.