When the trees start to change color here in the mountains, turning to red and oranges and breathtaking yellows, my spirit soars. It’s something you look forward to like you look forward to visiting Grandma’s.

My son works in Dallas and each year he tries to get a flight into Knoxville, rents a car, and drives around in the Smokies enjoying the colors and ambience of the fall season. He said, "You can’t imagine how hungry you can get for mountains and mountain streams."

Last time I was in Gatlinburg in the fall, I had a cabin that straddled a babbling brook. Best sleep I’ve ever had. It was chilly but I kept the window cracked all night long.

Cleaning out my birdhouses, I remembered the antics of the Mockingbirds this spring and summer. They are definitely the bossy-butts of the bird kingdom.

Two Bluebirds built a nest and were about to set up housekeeping when a Mocker built in a thicket nearby. They harassed the Bluebirds until they moved out. After the Mockers raised their young and left, the Bluebirds returned and raised two families.

Only hawks and eagles could stand up to Mockers during their high hormonal cycles. I saw them chase several crows right into the horizon.

Unattached males will often sing all night long trying to draw a mate. But after the family breaks up in late summer, they split up into separate feeding territories and show little tolerance for each other. Isn’t that human-like?

The famous Lewis Family has recorded one of my songs, and I am proud. It’s "His Amazing Grace" and is on their new THB-2035 CD titled "So Fine." The credits are messed up but I wrote it and surely they’ll get all that straight by royalty time.

Southern Gospel Music is one of the faster growing music genres. And no group does it better than the Lewis Family.

We just returned from Tennessee Fall Homecoming at Norris, Tennessee. It’s the grandest celebration of Appalachian music, arts and crafts.

It will not be held again until next October but while the smell of greens and beans cooking is still in my mind, along with the sounds of the best acoustic musicians in America, let me offer you contact information so you can plan now to savor this event next year. To get on their mailing list, write Museum of Appalachia, Box 1189, Norris, TN 37828 or call 865-494-7680. Ain’t nothing like it in the world.

Ever tasted Muscadine Wine? It’s in the grape family but it just tastes hardier than regular grape wines and juices.

I think of it this time of year because I used to "accidentally" drop in on Pap Harvey about this time of year and he’d crawl under the house where it was working in a big churn and we’d drink it out of milk shake cups, sitting on his front porch swing atop Bakewell Mountain.

I wrote a song about it titled "Nothing Going Down on Bakewell Mountain But the Leaves." Which really wasn’t true. Papa’s Muscadine Wine was going down, too.