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Family Genes

I have inherited a box of all the family photographs and have been systematically sorting them out and trying to find out whos who... not an easy task as a lot of the photographs are from the early 1900"s and before. All my ancestors. Somebody once told me that you'd be lucky to be a face in somebody's album one day but its amazing how genes come through the generations and appear when you least expect them. I studied genetics at varsity so I understand all the science behind genes and heredity but genetics is not just science. It is also your sister or brother or son or daughter, the people behind the genes...
While sorting through these photos I came upon a picture of my paternal grandmother at about the same age as Reagan and I was struck by the similarities between them, in fact it could be a photo of the same toddler. Reagan is the only grandchild on both sides to have brown eyes and both my grandmothers had brown eyes too. But I found myself wishing that they could have met my children, not because of the likeness, but simply because of the joy I think they would have had in seeing them. Unfortunately it is not the way of the world and the lesson in that should be that everyone lives and dies and there will be things you do and things you never get to do or see, but never regret this, live in the moments you have and find peace in the fact that maybe a great great granddaughter or grandson will have your hair, or your laugh or even your crooked teeth - that is life...

Mackenzie

Reagan

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