Nothing makes me fearful like a letter from the IRS. It’s a different kind of fear. In my mind the IRS is a big office somewhere with a few tired people sitting at desks with large piles of paper. They are staring at the walls in a trance because there is no way for them to look at more than one paper each day, and they may not even get that far. I feel sorry for them.

At the same time, they have computers that randomly spit out scary letters to unsuspecting folks – none of whom are really trying to defraud the government by not paying their taxes.

This morning I opened that scary letter from the IRS.

It was a fearful time because I knew it would be like trying to reason with a big, lumbering giant who couldn’t read or hear me screaming. Once the giant thinks he is owed money he is deaf to evidence and arguments because my paperwork will be on the bottom of the pile on a desk in the big room with all the comatose workers. It may take two years before it gets read – two years of increasing penalties and interest on the money I never owed in the first place. I know all this from previous experience.

Supposedly I owe roughly (because I left the letter with my tax preparer and can’t remember the exact amount) $7,400, plus a $1,500 penalty for not paying this “substantial” amount, plus the interest on it for the last two years. It was from the 2019 tax year, which they are just getting to now. So, almost $10,000!

My tax preparer says not to worry. She already knows what the problem is. I hope she is right, but I’ve heard that from an accountant before – one who ended up as frustrated as I was after months of lost communications, numerous phone calls, and the hiring of a special representative to “walk” my paperwork through the big office and put it on top of someone’s pile. Before that whole thing got settled, the giant had withheld that year’s tax return and was garnishing my social security income.

It’s one thing to fear a system that works, but worse to fear a system that is pretty much broken. It’s like talking to a wall.

Bottom line: God is my provider and he knows what I need. Even if it were true, and I had to pay $10,000, I would probably survive. But it’s stressful fighting giants and I was hoping for a quiet year… just sayin’.