Working Like an Uncle... For an Uncle

Trying to find a better balance

My father painting

I remember growing up and being able to tell which cousin’s house a forgotten shirt came from by simply smelling the laundry detergent. I still might be able to, and it’s a strange thing to think about that: how many of us have a signature scent. But I never realized that pheromonic imprint could transfer onto thin white sheets of paper. 

That is until I started filing tax documents for my CPA Uncle Ryan. 

For the first few months of this project—if I wasn’t traveling, I was working behind the bar once or twice a week and spending most days writing, planning, creating marketing pieces, and hanging with uncles. These last weeks, I’ve had very little time to sit at the keyboard and, in the exhaustion, find myself laying on the couch with my computer after a long day, drifting between sleep and mindless scrolling, dreaming of someday soon getting proper work done. 

I have managed to take saunas with some uncles, attend a few sporting events, and recently spent the weekend with Uncle Nick, Aunt Julie, and their ten kids. But the day-to-day workload has been tough to balance and grinding me into dust.

That being said, this is not a ‘woe-is-me’ situation. I’m still not working nearly as hard as many of my fellow Americans. In fact, I’m continually making the joke that I’m “working like an uncle.” 

My Uncle Ryan is at the office from six to six most days during tax season, and my Uncle Dave works three jobs year-round. I don’t think my Uncle Paul has ever gotten eight hours of sleep, and most of the others are working full-time or running businesses while raising kids, coaching teams, sitting on school boards, and maintaining households. 

Of course, I have aunties who work just as hard—or harder, and they carry my uncles in many of those responsibilities. But I’m consistently shocked and confused at how so many in our family are crushingly busy from sun up to sun down. 

I want to know how my uncles stay motivated…and how they stay sane. Obviously, having a family to provide for has to be a massive piece. But whenever my schedule is grueling week after week, I burn out so quickly and continually have thoughts of, “How does anybody do this?” I’m grateful for the tax-season opportunity—maybe a little bit because I know it will end—but working two jobs is draining. And I’ve really come to realize how much time it takes to get out a proper blog. 

Over these next few weeks, my goal will be to find a better balance and a new writing routine because as we’re in the heart of tax season and my energy reservoir and motivation dwindle, I feel myself slipping further behind on 18 Uncles work…the whole reason I came home in the first place.

My job at my Uncle Ryan’s tax firm—my small temporary role in the larger enterprise—is not all that difficult, especially compared to what the actual CPAs are doing. Client source documents, as they’re called in the biz, are collected and put into large plastic folders that are placed on a filing shelf. My job is to take a few folders, rifle through the documents, open envelopes, remove staples, eliminate blank or instruction pages, organize and scan everything, and then run them through a software program, double-checking all the names, numbers, and important information transferred correctly—often reentering the key details by hand. 

Again, it’s not super complicated; it’s tedious and time-consuming. In the past, they had college students come in and do it, but their schedules were too unpredictable and some weren’t showing up for their shifts. So, back in October when I was in Howell with Uncle Jeff visiting Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Crystal, I got a call from Ryan, asking if I’d be interested in some part-time work during tax season. 

He said I could choose my own hours, but warned me upfront that it was “busy work.” The flexibility sold me, and it works out well because I could use some additional savings as my next year is a massive question mark of travel, writing, and uncertainty. 

But when starting the job, I didn’t expect the smell. I crack open that plastic folder, pull out sometimes close to one hundred pieces of paper, and a scent wafts into my face as I plop them onto the desk. 

I get hints of floral perfumes, sometimes what I think is sawdust, maybe some motor oil—but that might just be because I saw a smeared fingerprint, and obviously, the smokers are very evident. But I’m pretty sure I can tell the level of smoking, which clients are at a two-packs-of-Marb-Reds level and which smoke Camels with the window open, propping their arm on the windowsill, holding that smoldering white ciggy in the cold winter air while a trail of smoke inevitably drifts back into the kitchen and permeates the tax documents that are splayed across the table and eventually land on my desk. 

And it can feel good, grinding all day. There’s a feeling of accomplishment when putting in epic hours. After a few recent doubles, I hit the pillow pretty damn proud, but I didn’t get anything done for 18 Uncles. I didn’t even have time to think about the project or questions I’m going to ask the next uncle. 

Again, half this country is working a lot harder, but I want to get out a quality post every single Saturday. That has been my goal. 

So during the heart of tax season, learning as I go, I’m going to try a different strategy. As someone who feels the best in the morning, I’m going to write for an hour or so before I do anything else. And I’m going to try to stay out of the distraction trap that is social media and Netflix. I know I’m working, but I know I’m still wasting a lot of time. 

Any creative journey has its ebbs and flows. April 15th will come soon enough, and I’ll be done filing—and smelling—tax documents and tediously checking that all the numbers transferred. 

While shuffling papers, I’ve been listening to Rick Rubin’s book The Creative Act, and in it, he wrote how one shouldn’t think about the end result when creating, and that it’s much more important to enjoy the process. 

I need to remind myself to stop looking at the numbers, stressing about the coming self-imposed Saturday deadline, and simply enjoy the process of chilling with my uncles and writing about how lucky I am to be hanging out with these cool-ass men. 

And I need to know how they stay motivated, how they get out of bed so early, how they work so damn hard all year long, and how much coffee they drink.

I need those answers… but much less caffeine, because I’m nearing my limits. 

One Love.

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Grandpa Peterson

Uncle Wally

Uncle Tim

Uncle Todd