who are we?

fortunately, the bad haircut is starting to grow out a little. but notice the unnatural arc on those bangs. um, yeah.
today i did something i never thought i'd do - i took a sample of my dna and sent it away to people i don't know, people i'll never meet.
tayloe's become friends with the director of the genographic project, which is trying to answer the question of how we all got to where we are today. it's a good question, especially since there's genetic evidence that shows we all descended from one african ancestor who lived 60,000 years ago. some day when little tayloe asks us how he got here, maybe we can give him a really solid answer - even map it out for him. and maybe, too, i can start to accurately answer the 'are you swedish' questions.
so i swab, swab, swabbed the inside of my cheeks and tayloe did too. his results will trace his mitochondrial DNA (passed from mother to child) and so will mine (because that's all i can do, what with me missing the Y chromosome and all).
we still want to do his father's family and my father's family and each of our mother's father's families so if some of you randomly receive these genographic kits in the mail, you'll know who they're from. open 'em up and send 'em in. it's completely anonymous - your name isn't attached to your dna - and you'll be part of mapping the human journey.
cool.