Spitting for Science
The process for donating DNA was…awkward.
When my boss suggested a story in which I get my genome tested, I was expecting needles. I don’t know why, exactly, but I immediately envisioned white lab coats and goggles and latex gloves and scary needles. As a frequent watcher of television, I’ve seen DNA taken with mouth swabs, so why my mind leapt to a blood sample is beyond me.
Needless (and needle-less, ha ha, Vaudeville!) to say, it wasn’t that complex, but it’s wasn’t that comfortable.
There are only a few companies out there that do commercial genome testing. We chose to use 23 and Me – so named because of the 23 chromosome pairs they examine – and paid them about $1,000 for the service.
In return for the money, they sent out a box conceived like a Russian nesting doll. I swear, everything I opened had something else inside. There may still be hidden bits in that box. Maybe that’s where the missing microfilm is.
The real prize lay deep within the boxes and sleeves: A test tube. More to the point, it was a test tube that I had to spit in. A lot.
I don’t want to give you the wrong impression about me. I spit. Not all the time, certainly, and not at people or on graves or anything. But if an occasion occurs and I have an excess of saliva, I have been known to get rid of it in the time-tested manner of spitting.
That said, spitting in front of people, as I had to do because my boss insisted on photographing the whole thing for Findings, was not easy. For one thing, it’s gross. For another, when you are stressed, saliva doesn’t build up so much as dry up. I had to work to manufacture DNA and it was pleasant for no one.
When I’d finally filled to the line – which took much longer than I expected, I snapped on a cap filled with “buffer fluid” and mailed my test tube back. The testing could take up to two months and I haven’t yet gotten word that my spit is being analyzed.
In the interim, I welcome your questions, comments, recipes, song requests and movie recommendations, all of which can be posted by clicking on the link below. I cannot promise that my replies will be any less awkward than spitting into a tube in front of a crowd of people.
