Neither more nor less

This hand belongs to X and today it does not grasp as it should ; as it could yesterday . X can not now hold a glass or bottle or write with a pencil . He can not today button his shirt . A doctor told him that in time his hand will probably again be fully functional , but not for a while .Last night this hand was damaged in an attack in the East Village . X was beaten badly in the street last night by a gang of thugs.

X was mugged and beaten on 9th street at around 2:00 AM Saturday morning . There were in all 5 attackers and it seems the motive was robbery. X does not remember much more than that he woke up in a hospital emergency room bloody and in pain. What little X had , the 5 took and ran with . He vaguely remembers the attackers going thru his pockets .

I call this man X for a variety of reasons including concerns for his privacy and safety . X is not well off ;he does not have a home of his own in the East Village . For that matter he does not have a home anywhere . X offered me the opportunity to photograph his beaten ,bruised and scabbed face but I chose not to . I have known X for some time now and he is a worthy, good-hearted person . Tonight when I saw his battered and bruised face and his barely functional hand ,shocked , I asked him what had happened to him . He told me the whole story in enough detail . Later ,while looking away , he began shyly and painfully to tell me that he was leaving the area for a while because he just couldn't live like this any more . We talked some more and then I took this picture of his hand .