When drummer Joe Russo takes a moment to reflect on his decades-long friendship and collaboration with guitarist Tom Hamilton, he can’t help but be in awe of their cosmic connection. 

Hello from Room 202 at the Holiday Inn Express on the outskirts of the small town of Lake Wales, Florida.

Editor’s Note: Since first rolling into Haywood County in August 2012 to start work as the arts and entertainment editor for The Smoky Mountain News, Garret K. Woodward has been extensively documenting banjo players around our backyard.

In the mid-1960s, when Bill Allsbrook was a med school student at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, he decided to pick up the banjo. 

Hello from the nearly empty bar counter of the Vail House Oyster Bar & Grille on the outskirts of downtown Goldsboro, North Carolina — a city seemingly forgotten by the sands of time and 21st century progress elsewhere. 

And so, we enter the whirlwind holiday season once again. Honestly, it feels like I was just in Knoxville, Tennessee, leaning against the bar on the second floor of the Preservation Pub in Market Square on New Year’s Eve when the clock struck midnight. 

Performer. Writer. Director. Instructor. Photographer. 

Hello from Room 1029 in the Blue Valley Cottage at the Old Edwards Inn, situated near the intersection of U.S. 64 and Main Street in downtown Highlands. 

Hello from Room 6102 at the Sonder motel on the edge of Old Town Scottsdale, Arizona. It’s 80 degrees outside in the late morning, with the dry heat of the Southwest steadily rising like the hot sun above the high desert prairie surrounding this vast, metropolitan area. 

It was at 7:27 a.m. Monday when the red ball of fire broke the horizon line at Wrightsville Beach.

A soothing mid-fall breeze floats across my front porch, through the screen door and into the apartment, ultimately swirling around the writing desk facing a bustling Russ Avenue within sight. 

It was an otherwise quiet Tuesday evening when my girlfriend started in on me once again that it was high time to get rid of the old couch in our apartment in downtown Waynesville. By last count, it was probably the fifth or sixth time she’d said that this year.

Stepping outside the small log cabin, I took a moment to collect my thoughts. Vast farm fields and ancient dirt in the rural countryside outside of Goldsboro, the cool air of an impending fall was felt with a sense of relief in a place where heat and humidity reign supreme. 

Somewhere around Schroon Lake, New York, just following a quick hike in the Adirondack Mountains, it was decided to head further down Interstate 87 to I-78, onward through Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to get to Raleigh, North Carolina, for the International Bluegrass Music Association award show last Thursday. 

It’s never easy to go home. And I think it only seems to get harder, perhaps more abstract and blurry, as one gets older — further and farther between from the starting line, literally and figuratively. Case-in-point, I recently returned home to my native North Country. 

It’s 9:54 a.m. Tuesday. I’m sitting at the old wooden kitchen table at my parents’ farmhouse in rural Upstate New York, within close range of the Canadian border, just a few farm fields away from the mighty, ancient Lake Champlain. 

It’s 11 a.m. Monday. Currently sitting in the rec room of my aunt’s high-end apartment complex on the outskirts of Charlotte.

The alarm on my smart phone echoed throughout the small cabin. It was 7:30 a.m. Saturday and I had to be somewhere in an hour — hopping onto a saddle for an early morning horse ride. 

Emerging from the rental car, a slight drizzle from an early evening storm rolled across the high-desert landscape of Morrison, Colorado. The Western skies overhead turned dark and ominous, only to quickly retreat and head for the skyline of nearby Denver. 

Covered in sweat, I was about three miles into a Friday afternoon run around Lake Johnson on the outskirts of Raleigh.

Mailbox 278 (pictured) along Route 581 in the unincorporated community of Nahunta, North Carolina. In the rural depths of Wayne County on the outskirts of the small city of Goldsboro. 

Exiting the elevator of the Cambria Hotel in downtown Asheville on Monday morning, I noticed the “Sunset Time” scribbled on the lobby sign said 8:29 p.m. Four minutes shorter than what I first saw when checking into the Cambria last Thursday evening. 

Parking the truck at the intersection of the Appalachian Trail and the Nolichucky River on the outskirts of the small town of Erwin, Tennessee, early Monday afternoon, a hot sun kissed my forehead emerging from the vehicle all while lacing up the ole trail running shoes.

Hello from Room 209 at the Super 8 on the outskirts of Rawlins, Wyoming. Late morning and taking my time to get my bags packed and tossed into the back of the rental car.

Hello from Room 312 at the Apres hotel in Whitefish, Montana. Late Sunday morning. High of 91 degrees with low humidity and hot sun high above the desolate Rocky Mountains in this remote part of the lower 48 states. 

Hello from 36,000 feet above the Midwest on this otherwise quiet Monday afternoon.

On his latest album, “Love is Enough,” Asheville indie-rocker Andrew Scotchie comes full circle with a bevy of things in his existence — a heavy past of sadness and grief, present moments of genuine gratitude and positive change, endless possibilities of a promising future within reach.

At 6 p.m. this past Friday, I was supposed to be walking into my 20th high school reunion at the Latitude 45 bar in the small Canadian Border town of Rouses Point, New York (population: 2,225). 

Whether it’s Sunday evening, Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning, I’m usually trying to sit down and write this here column. Most likely, it’s Tuesday morning. Words, thoughts and sentiments spilling out of my fingertips in a haste to make the late Tuesday morning deadline to ensure I make the print copy before it gets kicked out the door, onward to the printer as we finally “put the paper to bed.”

Nothing says summer more than the Fourth of July, and in Western North Carolina, we celebrate Independence Day with gusto. Between majestic fireworks, sizzling hot dogs and hamburgers, cotton candy, games, live music and craft demonstrations, there’s a little bit of everything for any and all. So, grab your lawn chair, sunglasses and adventurous spirit, and enjoy this special weekend. 

Pulling off Interstate 240 in downtown Asheville last Friday evening, I stopped my truck at the intersection of Hill Street and Riverside Drive. The parking lot at the Salvage Station across the street was already full, so were other nearby lots. What to do, eh? 

Pulling up to the entrance of an old logging road in the depths of Balsam Gap between Sylva and Waynesville, a hot sun hovered. Lace up the running shoes and duck under a shady tree canopy along the isolated dirt road of solitude. 

It wasn’t the daily sounds of passerby traffic on Russ Avenue in downtown Waynesville or the Tuesday morning garbage truck flipping up the dumpster to empty its contents from the pizza joint next door to my apartment that woke me up.

Sitting at a table on the front patio of the Highlander Mountain House, Jason Reeves looks up at the historic lodge with an expression of gratitude, only to then gaze back at the bordering Main Street of downtown Highlands.

It’s 11:57 a.m. Wednesday in downtown Canton. Daniel Gregg is standing on the Park Street bridge overlooking the Pigeon River. Leaning against the bridge, Gregg kept gazing up at the tall smoke stacks of the Pactiv Evergreen paper mill. 

I awoke to the sounds of numerous police sirens. It was 6:30 a.m. Sunday. Looking out the eighth-floor window of the hotel onto downtown Indianapolis, Indiana, it was a police escort of numerous official looking vehicles en route to the nearby Indy 500. Within minutes, another police escort, then another. 

It was just about 9 p.m. last Saturday (central standard time) when I found myself side stage at the legendary Ryman Auditorium — the “Mother Church” — in the heart of Nashville, Tennessee. 

In its second year, the North Carolina Guitar Celebration in Brevard has much to celebrate — the sacred six-string instrument itself, a genuine moment of togetherness and the 100th birthday of the late Doc Watson. 

Recently, I came across a real estate listing for a house while scrolling Facebook. It was located on the east side of Jackson, Wyoming. In the shadow of the Grand Teton Mountains, any and all homes and undeveloped land are a mad scramble to bid on and purchase. 

Last Thursday morning, Kevin Sandefur spent five hours spreading gravel in the parking lot of the brand new BearWaters Brewing location on South Main Street in Waynesville. 

Hello from Room 209 at the Home2 Suites by Hilton on the outskirts of downtown Decatur, Alabama. It’s Monday morning. Cloudy skies and temperatures pushing 80 degrees by mid-morning.  

A former Baptist preacher and military veteran, Abe Partridge is now regarded as one of the most unique and captivating singer-songwriters currently emerging from the Southeast. 

Hello from Room 5218 in the Falls Cottage King Suite at the Old Edwards Inn in downtown Highlands. It’s late Sunday morning with a slight drizzle and cool mountain air after two days of sunshine and mild temperatures.