In small towns where folk know each other by name, the sight of silver fences can be a cold wake up call to changes in the community. In the guest post below, a local resident Kim Sallaway laments the installation of razor wire shown in his photo above.

I live in a small town where most of us know each other either by name and friendship, or by appearance and familiarity born with grocery store aisle encounters and town festivities.

Security used to mean closing your doors, locking one’s car, shutting the gate after getting the dog and cats in for the night.

In the center of our tiny hamlet, there is an an empty lot used to park work trucks. Recently the owners erected a fence with shiny sharp razor wire topping it, presumably to keep the transients out of the rigs. “Americans on the move”, as my friend Pernel calls ‘em, have become a real factor here. The crime rate reflects it. Some of the city folks are coming to the country to steal. That is so sad.

We do more than just lock our doors at night now. We pray for a return to more innocent times that don’t require fences designed to hurt people.