There is an old Soviet tale about Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko. At lunchtime, he would retreat into his office and stare at the map of the world. The map was centered on the Soviet Union. The old Bolshevik would just glare at it as if it were a giant chessboard awaiting Moscow’s next move.
Replacing babies with pets stifles a person’s capacity to give and receive love, as it wrongly directs our greatest earthly affections toward ourselves.
