Jack and Jill have moved away

Jack and Jill moved out some time last week or the week before. I'm not quite sure when. Today the couple that used to be my downstairs neighbors (in this post, for example) started to move into their place.

Of course it's more complicated than that. The couple that I'm calling my "downstairs neighbors"—they need names, so how about if I call them Rick and Rory?—moved away a year or two ago, because they needed more space. When they moved out, Jack and Jill rented the apartment that Rick and Rory had just vacated, to use it as a "guest room" when one or the other set of in-laws visited. So actually it has been empty much of the time. 

Then a few months ago, Jack and Jill finally bought a house. Coincidentally, Rick and Rory were going to have to leave their new place for some reason that I don't remember. They posted on Facebook to ask if anyone knew of a place they could rent. Jill saw their post and called them to ask, "Hey, do you want our place? We bought a house, so we'll be moving out soon." And so it worked out.

There's more. You remember the apartment downstairs from me, that Jack and Jill rented as a "guest room"? They haven't relinquished that yet. See, they want to do a bunch of remodeling on their house, but the permitting process here takes forever. So they have moved into the new house without the remodeling done (so that Rick and Rory could move in); but when the permits are finally approved (maybe in a few months more) they plan to move out of the house and into the apartment while the remodeling and reconstruction is done. Then finally, when all the dust has settled (literally and figuratively), Jack and Jill will move back into their house and relinquish the apartment downstairs from me. When she described all this to me, Jill estimated that that transition might be a couple years in the future yet.

What will this mean for me? I don't know. Of course it means that the crazy parties Jack and Jill regularly throw will all have a different venue. But that won't really affect me because I haven't been going to them for a while. There was a while when I was sneaking out of them (such as here and here); and then, logically enough, Jack and Jill stopped inviting me. I don't resent that: it was the obvious thing for them to do, and I'm less uncomfortable as a result. I don't remember Rick and Rory socializing quite as ostentatiously when they were here before, but the have friends. And those friends did visit from time to time. I guess we'll see.

Of course, I've become such a hermit these days that it really doesn't matter how much or how often they entertain. It's not likely to affect me one way or the other. I'm coming to think this profound solitude is a bad thing, but I don't know what I want to do about it.