Your post really made me think, again, about what previous generations have been through-—yet they went about their business, worked hard, defended freedom, built and sacrificed for this, the greatest country on earth.
I salute them, every single one.
And you know what? We get some of our strength of character from our forefathers, but also maybe truly some of their physical strength is passed down to us!
My Father grew up working on a farm. He would plow behind a horse all day, yet I can recall his admiration for the Germans work ethic after WWII ended.
He was with some of the first American troops sent into Berlin after the Russians captured it. He was in the combat engineers and they were charged with rebuilding Berlin. He said the Germans they hired worked so hard they sometimes had to make them slow down.
You nailed it. We are, in fact, the progeny of survivors. As I recall, there is a village in England where researchers found everyone whose ancestors survived the Black Death carry antibodies to the plague (or something like that).