i mean wanting the experience of love: that almost mythical love that people have written rapturous poetry about for centuries. i think this is particularly acute for women: you think, I want that. I want to know that love. and it’s not a disappointment when it comes. it’s stepping off the sandbar into the ocean: deep and thrilling and terrifying all at once. so the desire to experience that love inspires people to have children, to know the outer limits of human experience. it’s very hard to talk about without sounding insane or sentimental, but that is my project: to put love back on the agenda as a concept, rather than denying it’s there because it seems too irrational a thing to talk about.