Back to school for the kids — and total bliss for me

WHAT’S that sound?

Can you hear it? Shhhh. Listen closely. It’s the sound of ... nothing. Emptiness. Quiet rooms. S-i-l-e-n-c-e. Breathe it in, slowly, and savour it deep in your chest cavity. Exhale from the floor of your lungs. You are alone. Wander through the empty house in a daze, touching the silent walls as you go, floating from room to room, absorbing the deep calm of nothingness. Yes, I know I sound like a zen meditation CD but I don’t care, I’ve bloody earned it. So have you.

For the three most beautiful words in the English language right now are not ‘I love you’ — don’t be so daft — but ‘back to school’. This time of year they are the only three words to set your pulse racing. Four vowels and five consonants that mean you are about to get your life back. Not to mention your house. The television, the laptop, the Nintendo, the tinny pop music, the shouting and screaming, the bickering, the arguing, the wails of boredom, the demands and accusations and slamming doors — all replaced by ... nothing.

The only sound is the radio, quietly burbling tranquil adult stuff – a history of the duffel coat in four parts, maybe, or a Norwegian play about molluscs — instead of the endless loop of Rhianna or Florence or Adele. Not that I am anti-pop — I’m not THAT old — but a whole summer of your radio being hijacked can leave you muttering about the music back in your rave days being so much better, as your kids roll their eyes and tell you that you are, well, embarrassing and please don’t ever dance in public, even if it’s in your own kitchen.

And now — nothing. Just the light snoring of dogs from the floor, the drilling purr of the cat stretched out on a reclaimed sofa no longer swarming with kids. No gangs of pre-pubescents lounging around yakking into their phones, doing giggly make-overs and smearing blue nail polish everywhere. No mini Messis and Ronaldos mistaking the hallway for a football pitch, your doorway for goalposts. No-one confusing the kitchen for a canteen, or you as the 24-hour catering provider.

And now back to school. Off they go, one in an ugly new uniform, to a new place where she will be the youngest, where there will be people who are already drinking alcohol, smoking weed, having sex (and that’s just the teachers). Where new friendships will be made, new dramas unfold, as adolescence properly kicks in. The other one trots off to primary, football under his arm, zero interest in anything academic, other than pretending to be Fernando Torres at break time.

All summer they have been in training on how to do buses without adults. Goodbye, I call, as they leave for the bus stop. Happy, er, learning. And here we are, the dogs, the cat and I. A cup of tea. The silent bliss.