whenever i hear this song especially on the street in mexico by a mariachi band i get so excited! because the words blur for me and i hear "one jon almeda' as the chorus instead of the cuban inspired "guantanamera". i swear it really does sounds like "one jon almeda" in this wyclef version. i usually feel the need to loudly sing along with my own personal lyrical twist. smiling and thinking about my very special, ingenius, funny, creative, helpful, generous, sweet, extremely talented and super cute man.          my one jon almeda. 

first days back from vacation are rough. first days back with a snot nose, plugged ears and depressing rain outside are the worst. been moving slow today not ready to re-enter reality. dropped all my film off at the lab. am quite eager to see what i captured down south. to take my mind off my cold and the drizzle i enjoyed looking through all of jon's colorful mexico photos. most of these images were shot with his newest homemade lens. haven't named this one yet but it's a custom tilt/shift using one of my favorite lenses from my old enlarger. it's really quite perfectly soft and dreamy. it's just what we have been looking for. leave it to that clever one jon almeda……..                                       
we had such fun wandering the streets together cameras in hand. jon with his weird accordion lens wrapped in soft electrical tape and me with my square vintage box. trying to fight off feelings of self-consciousness and concealing our cameras however we could. me trying to hide mine in my much too small brown leather purse. trying not to look so obvious. hating the idea of being the nerdy over excited tourist. wishing we could be invisible and or fluent in spanish. but once something caught our eye, we forget all that. patiently waiting, taking turns, eager to see the rectangle or square that each other composed. each of us creating our own tiny theater inside the viewfinder. carefully deciding who or what our main character would be at that moment. some zoomed by us in a instant, others stopped us in our tracks and some created the perfect detour. these are jon's photographs from our last week together on the beautiful yet rather modest isla mujeres. enjoy, they are lovely!

and now we wait for the film.