Day Four, or: I Bent Over At The IRS Office Today

I got to bed last night sometime after one in the morning, not long after checking my bank account and seeing that the first axe had fallen.  The levy went through – account balance: zero.  At three o’clock, my youngest son’s alarm went off on his wristwatch for some reason and woke me up.  I couldn’t go back to sleep – my mind and heart were racing.  I thought of a lot of posts to write, and imagined the networks getting wind of the day-by-day account of a man who stood up to The Man and was about to get his ass whipped. 

I saw myself doing interviews and maybe getting a reality TV show that would document my trek through tax court and straight to prison – I’m crying, the boys are crying.  Great season finale; show’s over; on to the next.  This nation could stand to watch another alligator getting caught in someone's backyard.  What channel's that on?

All the while I lay there, I could hear the deep, relaxed breathing of my youngest as he slept next to me on the futon in the living room.  My oldest was sleeping in my bed (I have a one-bedroom apartment).  Occasionally my youngest, still asleep, would snuggle up next to me and lay an arm across my shoulder.  Somewhere in his subconscious mind, he knew he had just snuggled up to dad.  The thought of that was the only thing that could make me smile, because aside from my pounding heart and reeling mind, all I could feel was a crushing weight inside.

My alarm went off at six and it was all I could do to crawl out of bed; I could barely walk – the crushing weight, the anxiety over the future.  I checked the stats on this blog site to see if the revolution had begun in the wee hours of the night.  The numbers said no.  Nothing about me in the USA Today headlines.  Judge Napolitano hadn’t left a comment promising financial support and a crack team of lawyers (including himself) to help fight and win the battle.  It was time to wake up the boys and pour the cereal.

They sat up at the counter and began eating breakfast.  I stood opposite them and started to make their lunches on the other side of the counter.  I could feel myself tottering on the inside; my resolve was slipping fast.  It wasn’t the money that the levy took, it was the reality of the levy itself which brought the reality of possible prison time into focus.  The boys have been through a divorce, they’ve endured a deployment, and now they must also suffer the price of my civil disobedience?

I stood there spreading the peanut butter and I broke.  Wiping a tear from my cheek I said, “Boys, there’s something I need to tell you about.”

“Are you crying?” asked my 12-year-old.

“Yeah.  What I have to tell you isn’t going to be easy.”  They braced themselves and I understood their initial fear.  “No one’s dying,” I assured them.

“Oh, good!” said my 14-year-old.  “That’s what I was getting ready for.”

“It’s about the IRS,” I said.  The boys have known the basics of my stance for some time, and I read their minds again.  “No, I’m not going to prison.”  My little one’s eyes had filled up, but at this assurance didn’t overflow.  Relief washed over their faces.

I told them about last Friday at the IRS office and how I took a stand, and the things that had been going through my mind for the last three days as we'd spent time together; about wanting to curl up into a ball and forget everything, and about our hugs being a countdown, and I told them I couldn’t put them through the trauma of my being taken away.  As strongly as I felt about this insidious form of taxation, as strongly as I felt that the issue at hand is basic human liberty (though so few see it right now), I just wasn’t ready to have them share in the penalties of an unjust system.  And I told them I was going to go back to that office today and play ball, to regroup and pursue my aims without making them vulnerable.  I’ll keep sitting at the back of the bus a while longer, and preserve a false peace based on false freedom.  It was exceedingly difficult to go back behind the line I had crossed three days ago, but I had to.  Others have stood up to what they felt was oppression and stayed the course, risking it all.  That doesn’t describe me; not now, not in this battle.  Whether I like it or not, I wasn’t ready.

The boys were great listeners, and my youngest smiled up at me and embraced me with tears in his eyes, saying, “This isn’t our last hug.”

Sitting across from the IRS agent later in the morning, I was quiet and somber.  I found it difficult to talk.  As he gave me the plan of action to “bring me into compliance” so they could lift the levy, I let out a few resigned “Okay”s.

As he handed me a pile of papers, I said quietly, “I just need to say that I think what I am doing is wrong.  This is all wrong.  As a human being I have every right to work for my living without having to jump through any government hoops.  I'm being forced to pay to exercise my right to work.”  He handed me a Kleenex because, well, I needed one.  I felt an overwhelming sense of injustice, of coercion.  It was all I could do to hold it together emotionally – I felt like a pathetic traitor to a cause I have been writing and agitating about for six years.  I hadn't lasted three days.

I went home with my papers in hand, and have felt emotionally drained all day, but relieved for my boys.  Many of you have offered encouraging words on the phone and on facebook, and they have all been appreciated.  I have decided to keep focusing on researching, writing, and educating; to opening more eyes.  I’d be happy to be the John Dickinson of tax reform.  I don't have to be James Otis or Patrick Henry.

Now that the spectacle is gone, many of you who were drawn here will wander off and miss the next few posts, and I am sorry for that.  I’m sorry I couldn’t continue providing the day-by-day drama of watching the income tax play itself out to its disgustingly harsh end.  I’m especially sorry if you’ve been a critic all along, or if you’re on the fence as to the real issue at stake.  The next few posts I think will be very enlightening and may contribute a great deal to the average American’s understanding of human rights and freedom.  That’s my hope, anyway.

Those of you who stick around, let’s keep talking and sharing and researching and learning and always keeping our sense of humor.  And let’s keep pursuing liberty and exposing its opposite wherever we detect it.

Day Four – regrouping; back to the drawing board.