Day 1(Tues., May 31)

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Wow! I can't believe that a year after I went on a cool journey, almost to the date, I am doing the same thing I was doing last year. Well sort of. Last year on May 30, I begun a journey that took me and Salvador to Dallas, Texas for a summer internship. I started the same journal I start today. Last year's journal, however, was different. It was the first time I embarked on a journey away from home where I would be on my own. Or so I thought. The company of Salvador helped out a lot. Today I took the same road out of Southern California. Getting on the 10 Fwy East at midnight brought back all the memories from last year. The good times had. The great people I met. In those 10 weeks I learned a lot about photography, about Texas and (mostly) about myself.

Again, his time I wasn't all that alone. I had Cookie Monster as I do on every trip. There he was sitting on the passenger side, sometimes hanging from the window as he saw the landscape as we drove more than 800 miles across the U.S. Southwest on this first day of traveling. This Cookie Monster's nicknamed was "Hommie" because he stayed at home while I traveled around to many places including New York and all over Texas with my other Cookie Monster, "Roll Dawg", who stayed with my grandmother Esperanza when we visited her in Mexico State over the winter holidays. As you can see in the photo above, Cookie Monster wears an eye patch. No, he is not trying to be like singer Nelly, he's simply trying to recuperate from an incident at the Grand Canyon when I drove back from Dallas to Los Angeles in January. So, as you can see, "Hommie" has caught up on some of his traveling.

Speaking of traveling. I never like to drive by a place and miss what the surroundings have to offer. This time I had a little bit of time to spare as I drove out to San Angelo. So, when I saw a sign that said "Meteor Crater" on the 40 Freeway, I had to stop. The landmark was not far off the highway (a five minute drive) and I was able to see this natural beauty. This crater is so big it takes a 2.5 mile walk around it's rim to go around it. It's 500-plus feet deep. It's amazing how the impact on the earth created such a monster hole. I am glad I had the time to spare to check this place out. You should be, too. At least you get to see photos and read about it. I've never heard about it, so it was learning experience.

NOOOOOO!!!! AAAAHHHHH! Yeah, that's what came out of my mouth when I was getting ready to take a picture of myself and someone walked by and said "Oh My God, here comes another one!!!" Haha. Just Kidding. But imagine what would one do to take cover - NOTHING! The facts about this crater state that it took just 10 seconds for the meteor to get from the earth's atmosphere to the surface. That's fast!

I was walking around and this viewing area seemed pretty cool with the shadows. I guess it was the right time to start thinking photography. After all, my skills and talent are what brought me to San Angelo. Oh yeah, let me tell you how I got this internship. Rewind to 10 days earlier. It's 8 a.m. on Friday May 20. I woke up and checked my e-mail as usual and there it was. An email from Anthony Wilson, the managing editor at the Standard-Times in San Angelo. He was asking me to send in my portfolio and resume if I was interested in joining their team. Turns out, I am the first photo intern the newspaper's ever had, So that's quite an honor. They have heard about me through a source at the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, from which I will be doing a short, one-week internship in a week. My summer plans did not pan out, so I had the free time and I decided this was an opportunity I could not pass up. Luckily, within two hours, photo editor LaKeith Kennedy was on the phone with a proposal. I took it and the rest is history. I got lucky this summer. Otherwise, right now I would be scrambling to find a summer job.

So, the journey begins here. Stay tuned and see what crazy things Cookie Monster, my truckie "La Huera", my camera "Stephanie" and my dorky self get into this summer. If it's anything like last year, it's going to be fun. Enjoy!

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