By February, everyone gets crazy, pale, and angry and bothers everybody around, knowing that an extraordinary month is coming. It is the month to prepare the tax declaration that should be shortly submitted.
While everyone can prepare all documents properly throughout the year, I do not know anyone, who does so. I only know a large group of people who start to look for boxes to which they put their bills by the end of January.
In the beginning of February, they feel under pressure to sort out the bills. They realize that it takes so much time and energy, which they do not want to invest, so they start to look for a fiduciary. They shortly find out, shocked, that even a fiduciary makes sometimes mistakes. Moreover, if he does, you are responsible for them, since you are signing the paper.
In the past, I was just looking for bills. “My maestro” filled the tables.
Now it is up to me to cope with it. It does not matter if I deal with Swiss or Czech taxes. A friend Renda helps me with the Czech taxes and the Swiss taxes are in an electronic form. Here, I have Andulka’s support. She is a pro. She learnt from Peter how to fix her own tax declaration. She mastered it perfectly this year and she has already received a notification about how much she has to pay. She is incredibly able and I am glad that she stands on her own feet. After all, there is something about our upbringing. I was granted a postponement. Fortunately. I am learning both. It sucks.
I do not mind declaring property, earning and spending, it is normal and I believe that both countries invest the tax income usefully. I mind these forms. Crosses, columns, references to this and that, who can deal with it?
I want to live in an etheric cloud, in a state between nirvana and rebellion.
This admistrative reality does not fit in it. Well, there is no way to escape it. Steeled by my previous experience with administration, I am preparing meditation exercises in advance. Forms in my hand, plenty of energy, I am taking a deep breath and can start a calm phase. The Czech form is very pale; the colour is cold from the first site. I am throwing the form into drawer and go to take a shot.
The fifth, the tens…no worries, I am not speaking about alcohol, but about the dates in the calendar. Damn it, I have to fill the forms. I am opening the drawer with the feeling that something will bite my hand.
I am courageous. I am picking one form after another. I took four samples, just in case. It should be a piece of cake.
It is 9 o’clock in the morning, an hour would be enough…I have to leave house at ten. I include the street number, address, number of square meters we have, and it will be fine. I serve myself a coffee, light up a scent stick and…find out that I do not have the instructions. In euphoria that I was able to get to the office and find out the forms, I forgot the practical guide how to fill them.
The hour is getting shorter. My forehead is sweating. I am hardly breathing. I call a friend by phone…hello, would you know… ? I am getting nervous. I found instructions on the Internet. I see around eight pages. I do not want to fail.
I am starting with enthusiasm. I need another coffee while normally I drink only one cup. I does not seem that I will leave the house at ten o clock. Article 310 killed me – coefficient according to the article 10, paragraph 3 of the law – fill only for R and Z. Who, the fuck, could know it? You would understand changes in my vocabulary, according to the situation. It is creaking. Articles 311 – 326 are not any better…round decimals…it is fine, just to know what are the numbers to round.
Four a clock in the afternoon…kids, go to play, mummy has something to finish.
Around six a clock I put the dinner into oven…oh, my goodness, it is seven already. Dinner has burnt. Children are hungry. Go to wash and to sleep. “Sugar, coffee, lemonade, tea, rum and bang!”[1] I do not have time.
It is midnight, it is raining, it is calm and idyllic behind the window…however, there are many dirty handkerchiefs, gnawed nails, a broken mug, which is a victim of my anger and the form. Not teared to shreds yet. Filled.
I am exhausted. I think about meaning of life, eternity and vanity. Was it all really necessary? What for is all this filling? Who invented it? I feel like a fly caught in the net of stupid tasks.
I have to take a second breath…before there will be another tax on a horizon…and it will be during the weekend. I have to deal with the Swiss taxes. They have a sophisticated system in GeTAX programme, where everything should be filled. There is a help for every information requested. It is not bad to speak French. The help is not in another language. My enemy is the language barrier here. The tax declaration is fine. It is well arranged, only arduous. The confirmation of postponement of submission is helpful. The State has postponed it to everyone. Due to Coronavirus. Tax declaration is never easy, however, in a foreign country without language skills is even worse. It is harder.
We were a good team for many tasks with Peter, and a bad team for some others. At the end, we managed everything, even with quarrels and conciliations.
Now I can quarrel only with myself and be angry at the system. I have to fill several tax declarations. I have to fill a part when we were a couple, so to include everything for Peter and me until the time he was with us. Then, I have to fill a tax declaration for a period, when I was alone. In addition, I have to fill again everything with a notary who has to send it to authorities. All fiduciaries of the world – unite…Nirvana is nowhere.
Cartigny,
4.6.2020
[1] Famous Czech nursery rhyme translated literally.