These essays by Delta Alpha Pi members originally appeared in Chrysalis magazine (2016). The essays are presented here with the permission of the authors. This work is protected under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Candice L. Horgan, A Circular Life Long before I ever saw Disney's The Lion King or picked up a book about Native American culture and beliefs, I already suspected that life moves in circles. Some circles appeared in the areas I gravitate toward, like the spheres and orbits of astronomy or those wonderful little round pieces in Lego sets that always seem to be just the piece you needed. Some circles appeared as patterns over time. Read More
Joe LeBlanc, Seeing Things Differently Progressive eye disease that slowly and continuously steals your vision until you are completely blind is a tough condition to live with. In fact, it can seriously disrupt your life while you re waiting for the impending darkness to close in. Gradual vision loss has been my reality for twelve years. Looking back at my fear of blindness and my early efforts to thwart vision loss brings memories of despair, humor... even hope. I did not know then that I would eventually achieve success and that it would arrive only when I could embrace my losses and uncover solutions inside myself. Read More
Cassandra Record, My Journey What does the word "disability" mean to you? For many people, disability is something really bad, something no one wants to have, something everyone frowns upon that makes people treat you differently. To me, however, disability means power, strength, and honor. I would like to share a few stories from my life with you to explain my perspective. Read More
Susan Sliney, What it is Like to Have Dyslexia When I was growing up, I always saw things differently. Pictures, books, words, letters, and numbers: they seemed normal to me in my own view, but I was really seeing them backwards. For example, when I looked at the letter "s," I saw " ." When I looked at the letter "e," I saw . When I started first grade, my teacher noticed that I was writing my letters and numbers backwards. She met with my parents, and they put me on an Individual Education Plan (I.E.P.). When I learned that I wasn t seeing things correctly, I knew I was different from other students. Read More