Battle Loc, a rapper from San Francisco lifts weights at his manager’s house in Los Angeles, CA.

Richie Goins Jr. watches from the window of his parents’ trailer as cinderblocks are brought in as the foundation for his grandmother's new trailer. Leetha Goins and her children Timmy, 25, Troy, 16, and grandson Will, for whom she cares, were displaced when a drunk driver swerved off the road and crashed into their trailer. A recent study showed that the child poverty rate has increased 5.6 percent in the state of Ohio over the past 5 years. In the town of Chauncey specifically, 33.3 percent of those under the age of 18 live below the poverty line.

Hannah Eich, 16, (middle) consoles her mother, Suzanne, who suffers from chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia. In the background, her son Peter, 10, plays in the shallows on the beach at Ocracoke Island, NC.

Hercules lunges at and bites William Sellers, 5, as he and his brother, Jesse Jr., 7, race around a car wash while being supervised by Scott Smathers, 18, in Chauncey, OH.

Troy Goins, 16, sucks his toe to console himself as he sits on his new bed in his grandmother’s trailer. His autism makes it difficult for him to deal with even the smallest changes, and self-stimulation or “stimming� is his way of coping.

Thirty-one years after Saigon fell during the Vietnam War, Be Pham, 96, attends a commemorative service in her new home in Westminster, CA. Also known as 'Little Saigon,' Westminster is home to the largest concentration of Vietnamese found outside of Vietnam. The Vietnamese population in Orange County totals more than 135,548.

Jesse Sellers Jr., his hair still wet from a bath, stands in his kitchen holding a trophy he won during his first dirt bike competition. As with many poor families in their Appalachian community, a large percentage of the family income is spent on “non-essentials� and entertainment. Jesse’s father has thrown all his time and the family’s remaining money into making Jesse and his brother pro dirt bike racers. “It was so cold and he wanted to quit,� Jesse Sr. said, “but I told him we needed those points and he had to finish. But he won something his first race!�

In a daring move a matador leans back from his horse to touch the charging bull during a Portuguese bullfight in Artesia, CA. The Portuguese style of bullfighting is usually bloodless and leaves the bulls angry but relatively unharmed.

Thomas “Stressmatic� Jackson, Marvin “Dooniebaby� Selmon and Anthony “Goldy� Caldwell of the San Francisco Bay area hyphy-rap band The Federation drink whiskey and smoke marijuana at a car wash in Los Angeles, CA, while waiting for their car.

DJ Goins (L) and his cousin Will (R) wrestle in Will’s new room in his grandmother’s trailer. Despite bleak surroundings, the children of Chauncey, OH, have an unbridled enthusiasm for life. But that dwindles steadily as they are confronted with more adult issues.

Halloween is taken seriously in the town of Athens, OH. Two weeks earlier, Ohio University students wander the halls of their dorm trying out their costumes. Adam Fardy’s costume is a modern day Jack the Ripper, and Whitney Osterhort is dressed as Christine from the film Phantom of the Opera.

Identical twins Kacey and Lacey Sellers, 4, were born deaf. Their disability wasn't discovered, however, until the age of two, when their parents became worried that neither had yet spoken. An ironworker at the time, their father, Jesse, cashed in his health insurance to pay for the $86,000 per-child cochlear implant surgery. Now, a year and a half after the surgery, they are essentially at the hearing level of a newborn. The girls have equipment to help them hear, but speech and other sounds are still foreign to them.

Kacey throws a fit at the Grover Center Audiology lab as her mother, Tracey, tries to strap on the processor for her daughter’s implants. Tracey finally had to sit on Kacey to hold her down. Because of various concerns – both for the gear and the girls – the processors are worn only for school.

School therapist Pattie O'Brien makes the sign for “bug� with Lacey during one-on-one tutoring. O'Brien has been working with the twins since they received their implants, helping to teach them sign language and develop their hearing comprehension.

Tracey is the glue that holds the family together. Standing in the observation booth at the audiology clinic, she worries for their future as the girls play in separate rooms, unaware of the differences that set them apart from other kids.

Exhausted after enduring two hours of temper tantrums and escape attempts at an Ohio University basketball game, Jesse still struggles with his daughters’ disability. “I didn’t know how to accept it. To me, it just hit me real hard. I blame everything on God. I probably shouldn’t. But they talk about how wonderful He is, and to me that’s not a very wonderful person to put me through that.�

Like many other children, Lacey and Kacey wind down by watching television, but to them it is just a sequence of moving pictures.

While playing with her sister, Kacey stops to gaze into the lights. The twins live in a world where visual information and heightened visual awareness play a crucial role in maneuvering through daily life.

In silence and drifting into the darkness of sleep, Kacey and Lacey lie quietly next to their puppy, as the sense of touch takes over as their vital link between each other and the world.

Thought of by some inmates as “a place to die,� Hocking Correctional Facilities in Nelsonville OH is a strange combination of prison and home for the elderly. Many of its 475 inmates will never again live a free life. One prisoner said that HCF is much nicer than other prisons he's been in because if you lie on your back, look straight up and ignore the barbed wire, you can see trees and blue skies – allowing you to imagine you're free.

"When I get out, there's no way I'm going back," says (name withheld), 63, a lifetime criminal who is currently serving time for escape, aggravated assault and forgery. The tattoo he proudly wears on the side of his neck says, 'Last Motherfucker Standing'.

The line trickles out the door and down the hall from the mess hall. The night before, a fight broke out during dinner, resulting in one inmate being hospitalized.

Each day the inmates confined to wheelchairs eat separately from other inmates in the dining hall so they can fit their wheelchairs at the ends of the tables. Special accommodations are taken for diabetic inmates as well, offering them an extra meal to keep their blood-sugar level steady.

While taking his medicine, (name withheld), 65, is monitored by fellow inmate (name withheld), 64, and Corrections Officer (name withheld) to ensure the pills are taken. (name withheld) was recently released after serving time for the possession of drugs.

(name withheld), 57, was a music instructor prior to being incarcerated for two counts of unlawful sexual conduct with a minor. He now teaches music lessons to inmates in the recreation area of the prison.

The average age for an inmate at Hocking Correctional Facilities is 63 years old. Many are confined to wheelchairs or oxygen tanks and the infirmary area of the prison usually has a plethora of ailing prisoners. The arrival of ambulances is a nearly daily occurrence and it is not uncommon for prisoners not to return.

Still serving time for gross sexual imposition, (name withheld), 71, has 5 years left before even seeing his parole board regarding his 12-50 year sentence. The aging inmates of Hocking are forced to accept solitude in place of hope. For them, the present only holds a past. 'Loneliness is that big black hole. The heart of every prison. The enemy.' - Elmo Chattman