Who Do You Think You Are?

Really.  Did you ever wonder about your family ancestry?  I'm sure you have, but did you ever actually bother to look into it?  All those people you never met that actually form who you are today?  The great grandparents and distant uncles and cousins in your family tree that in ways touched your life?  Do you know what any of these people did for a living?  Do you wonder how your parents came to meet?  Do you ever think about the choices that your relatives made and maybe even the coincidences that led to where you live, who you know and maybe what you do for a living?

I'm lucky enough to have had relatives who actually dove into our family history - on both sides of the family.  Thanks to those people I know my family ancestry stretches back on one side to Northern Ireland on the other to the Alsace-Lorraine area of Europe that has alternately been claimed by Germany and France for centuries. 

There have been several different spellings of the Mussen name - but all the same family.  I have photos of gravestones in Pennsylvania and in Canada with my last name spelled Musson and Mussin.  Nobody can seem to explain the different spellings - but we're all related.

There have been a few whackos in my family tree and some wonderfully intelligent, inspirational and difference-making people.

The reason I bring it up is there is a TV program on Friday nights on NBC called "Who Do You Think You Are".  Each week a celebrity takes a tour of their family history.  So far Tim McGraw and Rosie O'Donnell have found some amazing things about their families and the program shows you how they did it.  And the show will give you some ideas on how to trace your family history.  Even if you've never even thought about it, I'm sure after one episode you'll begin to wonder about all those people who came before you.