Where in the World is Mrs. Fallon? 2022: Inside the Grafton County Jail

Spider webs can be hard to see, but they illustrate intricate relationships...

"Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around--nobody big, I mean--except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff--I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be. I know it's crazy" (J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye from Chapter 22).

During the summer, in addition to lots of spiders, snakes and other assorted wildlife at Miles Pond, I get the opportunity to hang out with some really cool people. One such group of people is my chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR). The DAR, no stranger to justice issues, embraces its mission in today’s world by being “dedicated to promoting patriotism, preserving American history, and securing America's future through better education for children.” It sounds almost cliché, but it is not as I have seen this mission brought to life by the members of The St. John de Crevecoeur Chapter. One such inspirational illustration is our Vice Regent, Linda Clark. Linda volunteers her time at the Grafton County Jail to assist residents in getting their GED (General Education Development) Diplomas by preparing for and taking a series of tests. Linda became involved in the program through her church, but was able to able to arrange for our DAR Chapter to take a tour of the new Grafton County Jail in North Haverhill, New Hampshire on July 17th. In hindsight, I’m not sure what I was expecting, but what I learned, and more importantly felt will stay with me forever.

On the morning of the jail tour, I greeted the pond during my morning walk. I found a spider web outside of our cabin, and it captivated me. I was mesmerized when I saw how the web showed the myriad of relationships among many different segments. I saw one spider racing across the surface while other critters were stuck, unable to recover from that one, false and damning step. If the sun had not glistened against the threads just so, I too would have been captured in its silky, yet invisibly sticky lines. This image stayed with me the entire day as I began the tour and listened to Lieutenant Kendall discuss not only how this new jail offered more modern facilities, but how the new jail complex represented the philosophical changes in criminal justice systems as well. Lieutenant Kendall discussed programs, like Linda’s church ministry and GED programs, that are offered in order to rehabilitate prisoners so that they can serve their time and upon release, live productive lives. Novels like Catcher in the Rye and Les Miserables were the first to pop into my head. If only these prisoners in the Grafton County Jail could have been “caught” before they fell off that first cliff, spiraling into their behavior and crimes that led them here. If only they all had saviors like Bishop Myriel was to Jean Valjean in Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables. Not only did the Bishop’s intervention offer Valjean redemption, but Valjean’s redemption in turn led to salvation for others…many others. He, like Salinger’s protagonist Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye, caught them all, and I have a deep sense of gratitude, appreciation and profound respect in my heart for all of the employees and volunteers who serve these people each and every day, offering them an opportunity for redemption and salvation.

I could tell you that the world we live in can be a very dangerous place, but the news reminds us of this every day. Sometimes it makes us feel like we might want to lock ourselves away in our own homes and never come out again. After all, each one of us has been affected in one way or another by people who break the law, and perhaps we have even felt a self-righteous surge of pleasure when “justice” was served in one form or another. I know that I have. What I can’t illustrate in this blog is the heartbreaking feeling deep in my soul as I heard about prison programs for pregnant women or read their poems, saw their collages. What I can’t explain is the scary feeling in my stomach when all of the DAR ladies crowded, and then were locked into, the transition chamber before entering the various blocks or pods of the prison. Looking from the control room into their cells, into their eyes as we looked at them and they watched us haunts me still. I wanted to reach out and save them all, but how do I help? Having been a mom, teacher, boy scout volunteer, prayer warrior and youth group sponsor for the past 26 years, I do try to proactively support parents in helping students to become productive citizens who know (and do) right from wrong. But now, with this new experience from touring the Grafton County Jail, I want to integrate and thread this knowledge into what I already do to save them all. I have this heavy feeling that my salvation may depend on it…

We are all intricately, even though sometimes invisibly, connected, so “that's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be."