It’s my favorite time of the year. There is nothing like fall. To me, this season isn’t about pumpkin lattes, pumpkin ice cream, pumpkin beer, and all along down the line of things pumpkin. It isn’t about an excuse to wear new boots, scarves or leggings. It isn’t even about screaming at the top of your lungs at a football game.

It’s about chipping away. When you come into this world, you’re a block of unknown potential. Untouched and ready to be molded into whatever shape and size your ultimate destiny takes. And those lines and curves of your being come from experience, from wandering and discovering, on your own, just what you’re made of.

He sat two seats up from me. In seventh grade advanced algebra class, Tom Pearo was your typical late-1990s kid. A bowl cut atop his head, with Airwalk everything for attire, I first noticed him when he turned around to talk to Susan Seymour.

So, you’re Canadian?

Not quite, y’all. During my three years living here in Western North Carolina, I’ve lost count of the amount of times folks have asked me that question. They want to know where I’m from, how did I end up in Waynesville, and since when did I pick up a southern twang in my speech?

The blazing Knoxville sun was quickly falling to the west, heading further down the road to Memphis and points beyond. Rocketing down Interstate 40, I shot into The Marble City, merging onto Neyland Drive.

It’s funny, isn’t it? When you cross paths with folks you haven’t seen in years, and yet you are all still on the same page, where it feels no time has past since your last rendezvous.

It is the heartbeat of a town and its people.

While some communities pride themselves on their Christmas, 4th of July or Memorial Day festivities, the town of Canton showcases Labor Day — a time every year when any and all cheer the workingman, the blue-collar nature of a place as special and unique as its inhabitants.

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With the cornfields as high as an elephant’s eye, apples just ripe for the pickin’ and the last of the August sunshine still warming our glorious souls, it’s also time to harvest the innumerable records that have recently hit shelves and eager ears, ready to strike a fire in your heart.

It was the line in the sand. During the summer of 2005, I left one existence and embraced another. In a three-month span, I weaved through tragedy, heartbreak, and foreign countries, all the while striking the depths of my soul as the epiphany of my fate revealed itself.

My eyes fluttered open and, for a moment, I didn’t know where I was.

The room was familiar. The sheets and blankets were the same. But I wasn’t. As I got out bed at my parent’s house, I realized it had been three years since I was living under this roof, and with one day until my return to Western North Carolina, it was still surreal to be here, and now, in my native Upstate New York.