So, yesterday afternoon I hop in my little german sedan and head west towards the lovelier parts of Maryland. I have frequently complained of the lack of suitable countrified landscape here in this state, but there can be no such complaints about the western part of the state, which looks remarkably like upstate NY. I’m a country girl at heart, and the mountains and open spaces provide me with a remarkable sense of serenity. My drive was pleasant – traffic was light, the sun wasn’t in my eyes, and the music provided a pleasant backdrop to my journey.

Until I turned onto Roxbury Road. See, my destination was not a mountain cabin, or a dock on a lake. I was going to a prison and I’d forgotten just how shocking that first site of prison walls, barbed wire, and sentry towers can be. All of that idyllic landscape left behind, and there you are, staring at not one, but four different facilities for punishing those who have trespassed against us. The facility for which I was bound was an old stone structure that houses several thousand inmates. As I walked through the gates that clicked shut behind me, I kept thinking that I was so thankful to be able to leave, to walk out once my interview was over, and to go wherever I wanted. Regardless of my personal woes, or professional mishaps, I have the opportunity to pick myself off and have another go at it. Those folks on Roxbury Road got to see the mountains and valleys beyond their metal gates on the way into the prison, but won’t get to see them on their way out for a long time.