"The buildings reach up to the sky,
the traffic thunders down the busy street,
the pavement slips beneath my feet,
I walk alone and wonder...


Who

Am

I??????????"


I can still hear my first crush, John Davidson, posing that age-old question on one of his many records. I was 12 and laid in bed staring at his boy-next-door face on the album cover, his blue eyes....please don't get me started on John, a guilty pleasure whom I readily admit is out of character for me to love taking into consideration my hippie persona.

Sometimes you just can't choose who you fall in love with, now can you? ;-D


This long lead-in is to tell you that at age 50, I know who I am, at least one-quarter of what makes up SHARON ROZNIK.

My daughter participated in the National Geographic Genographic Project in which for $99 you send in a hair sample and they trace your mother's maternal DNA line from the journey out of Africa to, in our case, western Europe.

It is beyond cool. The results will blow your mind, and allow you to be a trail blazer in a five-year project that is a grand effort to understand genetics and the human journey.

Here's the premise, according to their Web site:

The fossil record fixes human origins in Africa, but little is known about the great journey that took Homo sapiens to the far reaches of the Earth. How did we, each of us, end up where we are? Why do we appear in such a wide array of different colors and features?

Such questions are even more amazing in light of genetic evidence that we are all related—descended from a common African ancestor who lived only 60,000 years ago.

Though eons have passed, the full story remains clearly written in our genes—if only we can read it. With your help, we can.

When DNA is passed from one generation to the next, most of it is recombined by the processes that give each of us our individuality.

But some parts of the DNA chain remain largely intact through the generations, altered only occasionally by mutations which become "genetic markers." These markers allow geneticists like Spencer Wells to trace our common evolutionary timeline back through the ages.

Different populations carry distinct markers. Following them through the generations reveals a genetic tree on which today's many diverse branches may be followed ever backward to their common African root.

Our genes allow us to chart the ancient human migrations from Africa across the continents. Through one path, we can see living evidence of an ancient African trek, through India, to populate even isolated Australia.

But to fully complete the picture we must greatly expand the pool of genetic samples available from around the world. Time is short.

In a shrinking world, mixing populations are scrambling genetic signals. The key to this puzzle is acquiring genetic samples from the world's remaining indigenous and traditional peoples whose ethnic and genetic identities are isolated.

But such distinct peoples, languages, and cultures are quickly vanishing into a 21st century global melting pot.

That's why the Genographic Project has established ten research laboratories around the globe. Scientists are visiting Earth's remote regions in a comprehensive effort to complete the planet's genetic atlas.

But we don't just need genetic information from Inuit and San Bushmen—we need yours as well. If you choose to participate and add your data to the global research database, you'll help to delineate our common genetic tree, giving detailed shape to its many twigs and branches.

Together we can tell the ancient story of our shared human journey.

My mother's maternal line, which comes from Czechoslovakia, is part of a group called haplogroup H.

Apparently, these people took a very direct route from Ethiopia, through the Middle East to western Europe.

That's about it. It's not very detailed at this point, but the more people particiapte, the more missing pieces of the genetic puzzle will start to get filled in, for example, we'll learn about which groups of people actually traveled this route.

I tried to find out how many people participated so far in the project, I know over 200,000, but when I tried to open the document on this stinking computer, that alien language came up, you know the one: gibberish out the assish.

Anyway, I'm picturing this ancient hippie woman ancestor heading down the road playing a flute made from a bird's leg, somewhere near Moravia, long funky, ethnic robes, OK, maybe some teeth missing and because they didn't wear bras, ever, time has taken it's toll, but when she looks at you with her grey-blue eyes, you feel it deep down in your soul, and it makes you throw back your head and laugh out loud.