The day has finally arrived that every parent dreams of: our oldest daughter is leaving the house. From the moment she arrived we couldn’t help but think “This is amazing, but hopefully we’ll get our lives back soon?”
Scene missing…
Three more daughters, and some horrible parenting adventures later, we are ready to get rid of her. 
“Arwen, you’ve been a great addition to this family, but it’s time for you to go away.”
Finally Erin and I can start thinking of getting the house back to ourselves (three more little leeches to go). Imagine waking up every morning at whatever time we want (assuming we also don’t have to work to eat), getting groceries and being able to eat them ourselves, going out to eat at Not Cheap places, and flying to sunny destinations with no guilt whatsoever? 
That’s the life for us!
These kids have really wrecked our lives, but one day we’ll destroy them by being great grandparents. Karma will be sweet as they send their well disciplined children into our home where we will let them do whatever they want, feed them garbage and sugar, and send them home! 
I won’t care if they’re up all night! I won’t care if they have cavities because I won’t have to pay the dentist after Erin and I just give up and order false teeth for ourselves. 
No way in the world I’m brushing teeth that don’t even belong to me. Toothbrush budget can be saved to offset scams asking for my credit card information which I’m barely avoiding falling for at my current stage in life!
I will appear all wise and all knowing when they ask for advice. 
No matter how they parent, I will simply look on amused and with the quiet reserve of judgement as if I was never guilty of a parenting fail. It will almost be true because it’s likely I won’t even remember them anyways. 
Then I’ll look back in senile cluelessness and repeat the same stories they’ve heard a million times as if it interests them. Stories about what life was like before the interweb and how I used to clean my room without a personal slavebot doing everything for me. 
Hopefully by then the emotional climate will have swung back to that of my parent’s generation so I won’t have to talk about/ deal with feelings of any sort and just live my life in an old man bubble. 
I want my daughters to hear how amazing I am every day of their lives and how little their moms know about anything. “Grandpa would understand!” they’ll say. “Grandpa would know..” “Why can’t you be more like grandpa??”. 
Revenge will be sweet. 
Every Friday since forever our girls have been having sleepovers at Grandmas. It’s a tradition that started when they were little to give Erin and I a break, but possible more to gain ascendancy in who the kids love more. We’ve never broken this tradition unless we were travelling and it’s been a godsend. 
It’s also got us thinking: What if they’d live there forever? 
No Go from the other residency. 
I really am kidding about all of this of course. And Arwen is only house sitting with a few friends for a month, which I am in favour of because she will return infinitely grateful of her return on investment rate with our minimal rent charged once our children are out of high school. 
“You monster! We’ve never charged our kids rent!!” 
That’s maybe why they still live with you… 
Anyways I might actually shed a tear as this stage of parenting has been the hardest for me so far. Walking them down the aisle is something I am NOT looking forward to. As a leader of people I prefer not to cry like a baby and curl up in a ball while photos are being taken to make fun of me with later. 
Maybe they will build dadbots who can do it soon? 
“Who gives this woman to this man?”
“IIII DOOOO” in creepy robot voice. 
THAT’S a wedding I’d go to. 
Listen, I really have no problem my daughters marrying men of good caliber (when they’re 35 and I’ve had a chance to date the guys for at least a decade to weed out the idiots). 
“What do you mean date the guys?”
It’s not a difficult thought. Instead of picking up Arwen, they’ll pick me up. If they touch my knee on the drive to the movie I’ll punch them in the face. If they drive up to my house to pick me up and honk the horn I’ll open the driver’s door and punch them in the face, then set the neighbour’s dog in the passenger’s seat because that’s what you honk car horns for. 
“Nobody will date them then!”
Naw, just men digging for treasure…