Family life in a nature-loving world

My wife and I are part of a large family. We have no children, no pets, but all the kin in the world. You, too, are part of this bonded group. It is true that we will never know the identity of the last common ancestor that you and I share with the old lady down my road, the birds in the back garden, the worms in the compost pile, the bacteria in my stomach, your stomach, and the deep sea, and all our other living relatives…