Living within walking distance of the farmers market has lots of perks. For starters, it’s a great excuse when asked, with a tinge of poorly disguised incredulity, “You don’t even grow a few vegetables, not even a couple of tomato plants?”

I wanted to be close to the source.

When I was 20 years old, I decided to become a writer. Standing in the mud at Bonnaroo 2005, I realized all I wanted to do what talk to strangers and write about them. It’s a fascination that will never subside, a thirst that will never be quenched.

I never realized little old ladies had such sharp elbows, or just how willing they were to use them, until my first experience with the Friends of the Library book sale at the Waynesville library several years ago.

Don’t go in there.

As long as I can remember, I’ve been told this. From my parents, teachers, friends or just strangers in general. It’s a phrase that can refer to a dangerous spot in the woods, front yards with vicious canines, disgusting restaurants or mismanaged places of business. But, mostly, it’s been applied to certain bars.

A whirlwind of global cultures, languages, costumes, music and dance has landed in WNC this week. The annual arrival of the Folkmoot international music and dance festival is a welcome respite from the mid-summer doldrums. 

It all started with an email. 

Last July, I was at a crossroads. Being a freelance writer for a few years, my usual summer work dried up before the warm weather even arrived. The publications I was contributing to in Upstate New York were losing money, rapidly, with their freelance budgets being the first casualty of a haphazard newspaper industry.

Ever since we splurged on a $2.99 plastic magician’s wand at Santa’s Land last year, my daughter has treated us to the occasional magic show in the living room. They are 90 percent theatrics, and 10 percent tricks. 

It’s the question I get asked the most.

“Is there any music around tonight?”

My husband is from South Carolina — the state where you don’t have to wear helmets on a motorcycle and you can detonate a backyard fireworks’ show packing enough TNT to last Wile E. Coyote for a lifetime. 

It had been 10 years.

I kept thinking those words while boarding a plane in Charlotte this past weekend, bound for my hometown. Tucked far away in the northeast, awaiting my arrival was a 10-year high school reunion.