Maria and I went shopping at a new Target in upstate New York for curtains for the downstairs windows. We didn’t find any we liked, but I was startled by the feel of this store, and could not see the end of it. I felt as if I were in a scene from Star Wars, and I thought me might just hurtle out into space. This kind of space is mind-boggling to me, not even close to being on a human scale. And they have a pharmacy and grocery store as well. I could hardly imagine the scale of shopping it takes to support such a place, and was sorry that we didn’t contribute. We fled back to our farm.

People love Target and Wal-Mart, too, and it is a dazzling space. Maybe it gets less overwhelming. It speaks to me about disconnection, and disconnection is a big deal in the animal world. It gets a lot of dogs and cats into people’s homes and lives. On the book tour, I was in airports that were cozier.