Genetics???

[biguglyman]

While looking through/organizing some pix, I found photos of my son, my dad, and I all around the same age and it got me thinking about how much who we are as well as who we look like can be genetically explained. My dad (far left) was a very smart man. Masters degree in physics smart. He worked for NASA for a time when I was a kid, then got hired away by Eastman Kodak to help develop and run their spy satellite program. I was always a disappointment to him as I never had the affinity for math (or school in general) that he did. I took after my mom's side in my love of music and "people" skills. That's me in the middle jamming my acoustic on the deck of the USS Barry DD933. I learned electronics in the Navy and work at that now. Far right is my son. He's getting ready to start his senior year at RIT majoring in software engineering. I haven't been able to help him with homework since he was in 4th grade. This is the kid who came home from school two weeks into his junior year of high school saying: "You know dad, I LIKE calculus..." So he sounds like Grandpa's boy, right? Well, he's also an outstanding keys player and can play everything from The Beatles to Porcupine Tree on the drums. He's my only son and all I can say is, thank god he didn't get my smarts and gramps' musical ability. I give his mom credit too. Her daughter from her first marriage went to Harvard. I am truly blessed. Anyone else have interesting genetic stories?

 

[blue4]

I look just like my great great grandfather, only with a different hair style.

 

[dreamadream99]

I don’t look anything like my dad or mom, but childhood pictures of a female cousin look exactly like childhood pictures of me.

I fully realize, this doesn’t help you one single bit, but I do see some freaky distant genetic similarities in families.

 

[bholder]

I look very much like my dad and not much like my mom, but there's a cousin on my mom's side in Scotland who could as well be my twin.

 

[two fingers]

I am pretty much my father in virtually every way. That makes me proud in a way. He's a great man.

We took very different paths. That opens up the whole "nature vs nurture" debate.

But personality wise, and physically, there's an old saying about a coconut and a tree....

 

[buldog5151bass]

It can be argued either way. It's like when they claimed being overweight. Are you heavy because your parents were overweight, or because they gave you lousy eating habits? Are you an athlete because your father was, or because he was your hero, and worked with you?

 

[danesdad]

As I have aged, I've become shaped exactly like my dad and grandfather. Which is to say, about 6 feet tall and pot bellied. My son is a beanpole, but I think things will change for him eventually.

 

[biguglyman]

Love all these family comparisons. I'm one of four kids and none of us look like each other. In fact, I'm 6'3" and my next younger sister has to stretch to hit 5'. My baby sister got grandpa's bulbous, Carl Mauldin nose. Don't know why she gets so upset when I ask her ; "What will you do!"

 

[BioDriver]

Well, this one time I was up for almost 60 hour straight sequencing and running comparative analyses on multiple different cotton genome samples....

Grad school horror stories aside, I'm a splitting image of my paternal grandfather with a personality split between my parents, but my brother looks like my mom and my sister looks like my dad's side. I'm pretty good at statistics and science, which I think I get from my dad, but I have no idea where my sister and I get our music chops, since no one else in our family can keep a tune (by their own admission). And Lord knows where my brother got his video game habit from.

 

[socialleper]

I didn't pick up much of my parent's physical traits, or my grandparents. No one has ever said "you look so much like..." or seen an old family photo and seen my doppelganger. Everyone else seems to have had that.
I picked up a lot of my mannerisms from my family, but that is hardly surprising. We all do in one way or another. People in my family say I'm smart like this person or that person, but I don't think anyone has ever said "You're a dipstick just like aunt Bertha. She was a real moron too."

 

[Ostie]

Thankfully I take after my dad, who was the kindest and most patient person I have ever known, other than his mother. She never cursed, drank liquor or uttered a word in anger to anyone. Salt of the earth.

My mother was a different story. Temperamental and prone to outbursts. Probably why the marriage didn't last....

I have old photos of my dad, and I resemble him a lot.

 

[MonetBass]

My grandfather on my mom's side was a professional single- and double-reed player in New York and Hollywood. He played sax in Desi Arnaz's band on the "I Love Lucy" show during its entire run. He also composed original music and arranged stuff as well. He could play any instrument, including piano and guitar. My father was an very good drummer (from what I've been told), and my uncle played trombone (which I later learned myself). Me, I can play just about any stringed instrument and write original music as well. Yep, it's genetics.

 

[Downunderwonder]

I am so like my Mum's cousin it makes me wonder.

 

[MattZilla]

Little disappointed that there's no pics of gin n tonics.

My dad's dad, my dad, and I are all acutely affected by ADHD, mechanically and mathematically inclined, we all look a lot alike, and we all think we're roughly a trillion times funnier than we actually are.

 

[kesslari]

I most closely resemble my ancestor Australopithicus. Only taller.

 

[Killed_by_Death]

I don't think I have a single blood relation who is musically inclined.
My one cousin has an acoustic guitar he doesn't play & his step-daughter plays all sort of instruments, but she's not really related to me.

When it comes to music I'm severely handicapped & I think genetics have a lot to do with that.

 

[hbarcat]

My father has a fairly rare neurological disorder that shows up in adulthood and becomes more noticeable with age. I started noticing signs in myself when I was about 25, and now that im 50 it's pretty clear that its genetic.

My daughter looks very much like my sister. In fact, I have pictures of both of them as children and most people can't tell them apart. And my granddaughter is a throwback to my maternal grandmother.

 

[biguglyman]

I had a brother-in-law that loved music. HUGE album collection, excellent taste. He would have given a nut to play. Absolutely no talent whatsoever. He tried...god knows he tried. Guitar, drums, even one of those organs with light-up keys and lesson books. Just could not "get it". I felt sorry for him...

 

[James Collins]

The funny thing is genetically, less than 25% of your genes came from your grandfather.

 

[biguglyman]

My wife is pretty smart too.