Suzanne Harrington: No empty nest for me, it keeps filling up with offspring and exchange students

"What began purely for economic reasons – the first category can’t afford to move out, and the second category have been bussed in to keep the wolf from tap-dancing down the garden path – has turned into something of a cultural exchange."

Suzanne Harrington.

You know that poem on the Statue of Liberty – give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses? Someone seems to have stuck a copy of that over my front door. Except my one reads give me your untidy, your fridge-emptying, your hungover. (Although admittedly these are my own children, who are here because I made them). But also - give me your irregular-verb learning, your English conversation-practicing, your cultural differences. Come one and all, and bring your dietary requirements, your emotional baggage, your giant suitcases.

Not for me the distant fantasy of the empty nest – I’m too busy making sure nobody from the first category inadvertently offends anyone from the second category, like by offering the observant Middle Eastern students pepperoni pizza and Stella. Or comforting the homesick Brazilian student missing her dog and boyfriend back in Sao Paulo, while reassuring the new Singaporean student that our German Shepherds won’t eat him, that they are family members who prefer watching Bake Off with us to savaging foreigners.