Winner of JDCC’s Essay Contest
High School Category (9-12th grade)
Daniel Chernoff, 18 years old
Eleventh grade – Yeshiva Nefesh Dovid,
Toronto, Canada
TITLE: Spiritual Upbringing from a Physical Downfall
On the morning of September 11, 2001, I knew my life would change forever. A few days earlier, I just moved to Toronto, Ontario, Canada to attend the world’s first deaf yeshiva. When I moved there, I felt like a pioneer. I was like a deaf Christopher Columbus moving to a new country and discovering new things about myself. Just before I moved to Toronto, I was doing things that an ordinary teenager would not do. I was struggling with many questions of why I am deaf and a Jew. Last year, when I was seventeen years old, I was really confused about life. I felt I was drifting. It all started when I begin to hang out with the wrong, crowd at my public high school. After meeting those young people, I started to go down the wrong path.
Before I got my cochlear implant last year, I was a very outgoing person who would always be looking for new kinds of adventures to experience, but I only had a few friends. I felt that my deafness was what was preventing me from having hearing friends. I wanted to socialize and have fun. After I got my cochlear implant, I started to have more friends. I was so thrilled and excited to try new things. My friends told me that I could party with them and have a good time. This was what I was looking for.
I started to hang out with my new friends. They would ask me to go to different places with them. After months of partying and having a good time, my relationship with my parents was beginning to falter. I knew things were starting to get out of control. I wasn’t doing well in school. My parents were quite worried about me and tried to help me but I wouldn’t accept their assistance. They tried to Winner of JDCC’s Essay Contest
