meet rayvonne

The other day a funny thing happened to me.  My husband had asked me to stop by a model apartment in midtown Manhattan to take some photos of his furniture and I went, not realizing that the apartment I was going to was the only finished one in the building.  I can't give the address here but, suffice it to say, it was pretty fancy. When I got there I was ushered by many doormen into a rickety elevator that squeaked and shuddered as we traveled up to the 38th floor.  Once there, the doorman opened another door, motioned for me to enter and told me to call him when I wanted to get picked up.  He closed the door and left without ceremony.  I looked around to get my bearings. This place was in stark contrast to the construction site that surrounded it.  I didn't know where the furniture was that I was supposed to shoot so I began to wander through this maze of an apartment looking for my subject.  The apartment was fully furnished and had a lot of really expensive looking artwork.  At one point, I noticed a foot, covered with a blue surgical bootie, partially sticking out from behind a door.  At first I thought it was part of the art collection but realized it didn't quite fit with the aesthetic. I cautiously called out, 'hello' and a man dressed in a security guard uniform stepped out from behind the door and greeted me.  He introduced himself as Rayvonne.  Rayvonne and I talked about the strangeness of his job and how incredibly bored he was sitting on the 38th floor all day everyday where no one, except the house cleaner, ever came.  It was a really weird existence and I felt for Rayvonne.  There are very few people who could make good use of this time. Rayvonne said he read a lot and looked out of the window (it was a pretty good view).  We joked that the places that we lived in were not so different from this place.  I sat with him for a bit and took his photo.