Sarah Manguso on Menopause

She writes, of the fundamental unknowability of something you have not lived:

Before I was a mother, I was pretty sure what it entailed. It was boring, trivial, sentimental, stultifying, gross… The actual experience of motherhood scuttled my arrogant assumptions.  When my son was born, I crossed the divide and was permanently humbled. Now I look ahead to another rite of passage, and wonder what further education is coming.