“THE LOST DECADE”
Those ten-plus years in between the end of college and marriage were a blast, but not particularly the most productive phase of my life. :) And I have not a whole lot to show for it. Except perhaps these – the Christmas cards from “The Dan Coonan Family.”
I was receiving holiday cards every year from my buddies with photos of their beautiful and idyllic young families. I had to respond in some way. I started this annual ritual essentially as my snarky and possibly disturbing method of mocking them, and it just took off. I actually wrote out all that jibberish you see below on the back of each card – 175 cards at its peak. That’s certainly the surest sign that I’ve got a screw or two loose. And it made my mom cry seeing this solo shot of me year after year. The great irony of course is that eventually the card became exactly what it had been mocking.
When I proposed to Donna in front of my old dorm in the middle of summer, signaling the official end of The Lost Decade, I convinced her somehow to keep it all a secret and announce it to the world in my Christmas card. (I lured her back to ND by telling her a lie that a buddy was getting married on campus and we were invited)
The proposal photo is on “the family is expanding” card below. - with her in my arms. Some people thought that meant she was pregnant. She wasn’t. Although she soon would be. (Instead of attending a wedding following the proposal we went in to Chicago to see the Dodgers and the Cubs in Wrigley. The proposal wasn’t official until she successfully completed a custom crossword puzzle I made for the occasion which she managed to do before we reached the Illinois border. It’s a good thing she did. I’m rambling now . . .)
Here’s some of the better “Dan Coonan Family” cards from that decade, including all the b.s. I included on the back side:
We tried hard to somehow remain true to the spirit of the card even after having kids, but its such a difficult transition to navigate.
Donna would have clearly preferred the cutest possible photo of the kids, but she continued to play along.
This was the first compromise - I had to allow her to let Claire look pretty in exchange for having Tommy look like this to all her friends. We considered two different cards but agreed on this.
Eventually, in an epic power struggle, Donna and the kids managed to take over control of the card. Such a sad day for me, personally. But every few years I manage to wrestle it back! Like this one.
And then some years, we compromise - with Donna picking the cute photo and I can write the caption. This is right after ND hired Brian Kelly.
But most years we have come to embody absolutely everything I used to mock. That, perhaps more than anything, prompted me to seek new outlets for any creative energies I still have left. (Perhaps that’s what set me on a course to write this novel.)