What Is Life? - Issue 106: Intelligent Life

Let me tell you what it's like to be an astrobiologist. I painted a white picket fence this summer. It was a task I'd set myself without realizing what a long-winded and frustrating process it would be. But eventually that endless scraping, priming, painting, and maneuvering settled into something therapeutic, even meditative. I'd paint the apex--dab, dab--run down the narrow sides, coat the smooth front, shuffle along, repeat. All the while acutely aware of being surrounded by the churn of summer in the northern hemisphere of a living planet.