Granddaughter #1 has moved out. We're coping as well as can be expected.

Which is to say, not well at all.

Younger Daughter and her husband Olaf and their daughter, my Granddaughter #1 (an occasional contributor here at Second Effort), moved out this weekend.

They bought a house in a nearby suburb. Their chosen real estate attorney managed not to screw up the transaction -- at least not so far as we've heard.

Tonight, then, Long Suffering Spouse and I go home to an Empty Nest.

If anybody had told me, two and a half years ago, that I would have had Younger Daughter and her husband underfoot for that length of time, I am reasonably confident that my head would have exploded. During this time I have (more or less smugly) recounted instances where Long Suffering Spouse became aggravated with Olaf for one reason or another -- failing to pick up after himself, for example, or eating as many meals as a Hobbit, or not getting out of the house soon enough in the mornings (Long Suffering Spouse and I had to wait for him to vacate the only upstairs bathroom before we could begin our morning ablutions).

I, on the other hand, was remarkably tolerant and understanding. At least, you can't prove otherwise, having only the self-serving testimony I've provided on this anonymous blog.

But, if there were occasional annoyances caused from living cheek by jowl, there was also Granddaughter #1. Both Long Suffering Spouse and I rather enjoy being grandparents. Even with the baby under our roof -- teething -- crying in the night -- we didn't have to get up. That was a job for Mommy or Daddy. I probably didn't change diapers more than a handful of times (I told Younger Daughter that I had done my quota with her and her siblings and I stuck to it, except in cases of dire necessity). In short, I was there for comfort and amusement purposes only. What a great gig!

When that child is happy, she makes a high-pitched shriek that is loud enough to set off nearby car alarms. More than once, I was sure my ear would start bleeding when she screamed like that. And yet, Granddaughter #1's shrieks are like Beethoven, Brahms and Tchaikovsky to my wife and me.

And now we won't hear them everyday.

Last night Younger Daughter and her mother were texting. This was the gist: Granddaughter #1 had swiped her mother's cellphone and called up a picture of me and her together. She started crying. Of course, many people have been sad when confronted with proof of their association with me. Some things are best forgotten. So that might have been all that was happening there. But Younger Daughter calmed the girl down only to have the child call up a photo of herself with Long Suffering Spouse. She started crying again. Younger Daughter said she was crying too.

"Me too," texted Long Suffering Spouse -- and I can vouch for the truth of her statement.

I interjected a text of my own in this sequence: "Me too," I wrote. But, then, I'm getting weepier as I grow older. If I live to see my biblical three-score-and-ten, I'll probably cry every time the Sun comes out from behind a cloud. Or goes behind. I'll presumably suffer from dehydration.

They had to move out. I know that. They have to have their own home. It's for the best.

But, today, it's also a little tough.