Conference hydra::dejavu

    Funny how karma always brings us together.  Congratulations on your
    good fortune.  Cycles seem to be coming together lately for so many
    people,... ending and beginning anew.

    
    Re.0 - That's wonderful!  It will be interesting for you to find
           out more 'coincidences'.
    
    Re.1 - That, Mary, is an understatement (having had yet another
           breakthrough/realization over the weekend....).
    
    Cindy

	More 'coincidences' seems an understatment after last weekend.

	During the last blizzard, we left to visit Mom.  The drive to
	Bradley Field was itself an exercise in faith.  We got window
	seats for both kids,  and they shrieked with delight at every
	bump and dip the 757's flight up thru the weather brought us.

	Talks with Hazel, my mother, revealed;
	The men in her family were not only engineers, but had hobby
	interests in music and motorcycles, as I have.
	My half-sister was born two days before my wife, her given
	names were Janet Lyn.  My wife spent much of her time in
	the family homestead with her maiden aunt, Janet Lynn.
	Both my mother & I have the same opinions of the managment
	we've worked for in vastly different enterprises.

	My sister is now a devotee of Sihk Dharma, her spiritual
	leader is Yogi Bahgwan Siri Singh Sajb.  While in Washington
	during the visit, we took the kids to the "Smithsmonian" to
	look at rockets and dinosaur bones.  At sunset, we found the
	Vietman Memorial, and walked along the names in that over-
	powering silence everyone seems to feel there.  As we left,
	the Yogi arrived with some followers.  How odd that our
	paths should cross even before I've met my sister.

	Where I grew up, the view to the west from our mountain included
	Whitcomb Summit, where Rt 2 crests Hoosic Mountain.  At night I would
	watch headlights there while stargazing.  It was the only sign of
	civilization, in our 40-mile view,since we had yet to acquire a TV.
	The Whitcombs, who built the Motel and Restaurant which gave the
	summit its' name, are related to my birth family.
								MWR

    I'd like to enter another note here concerning the heredity vs
    environment argument.  In almost every way, I'm more like my
    birth family than like my adopted family.  Of my 3 adopted
    siblings and their 12 children, I'm the only one to seek either
    and education or to move away.  All the others live close to
    where we grew up, I live 70 miles away.  None of them have had
    military service or traveled far from home, my birth family has.
    The point about education involves some very early and conscious
    choices.  At age 6 I was addicted to books, and expected to attend
    college.  Only 2 of the 15 noted above chose to finish high school.
    						MWR
    

    At what age were you when you were given up for adoption (hate that
    phrase)?  At birth? Later?
    
    When people talk about heredity vs environment they frequently forget
    about very early and *prenatal* environment.  Science knows very
    little about how much influence these have on people's life, except
    in extreme cases, but clearly there is a difference between heredity
    and the conditions in the womb (there is a technical term which
    lumps the two together, but d***d if I can remember what it is).
    
    When rigorous studies are done to determine the influence of heredity
    on some trait (e.g., some personality variable), the compare fraternal
    twins raised separately (50% same heredity, same prenatal environment,
    same (roughly) birth environment, different postnatal environments)
    to identical twins raised separately (100% same heredity, same prenatal
    environment, same (roughly) birth envirnoment, different postnatal
    environements).  Any wider variation in the trait between fraternal
    twins than between identical is probably due to real genetic
    differences.  (I don't know *how* they interpret it if/when there
    is wider variance in the identical twins).
    
    This in no way diminishes the amazing "coincidences" (?!) since
    it would be, if anything, *more* surprising if these similarities
    came about through prenatal or newborn environment.
    
    Thanks for feeling free to post about an essentially personal
    experience.
    
    						Topher

    I've been also 'questing' for my birth family for almost 40 years,
    and also hold the same opinion regarding heredity vs environment.
    My life holds very little in common with my adopted family.
    
    Too bad birth records can't be opened after the adoptee is of age
    (if the birth mother agrees of course.)
    
    Anyway, I am so pleased for you.  
    
    Mary
    

    My Dad was given up for adoption at birth because his parents weren't
    married.  All three of us kids showed musical talent and didn't know
    where it came from, certainly not either of our parents!
    
    When Dad's adopted parents died, he went looking for his birth mother.  
    She was looking for him at the same time and contacted the adoption
    agency, otherwise they would have never found each other.
    
    It turns out that his mother, my grandmother, was a singer.  My great-
    grandmother was an opera singer in Paris.  I majored in voice and
    performed in quite a few operas in college!  I was just beginning to
    study voice seriously when I met my grandmother (I was 13) so she has
    enjoyed following my progress.
    
    Shannon