Memory is selective. The brain, it turns out, is always editing, deciding quietly, and without our permission, what to keep and what to let go of. I was recently sitting on an exam table in a specialist's office, having just been told I don't have my father's heart. I know what she meant, and was grateful for the news, and I also know that DNA doesn't negotiate. I have his dry wit. (Some of) his height. Whatever his heart carried, I arrived here through it. I am simply not as
