It is 2021 and I am not sure when it began - that first time I responded to these strange spots and splotches attached to tree trunks and rocks, old wooden fences, wet concrete, and fallen branches. I need to search my photos, see if I can find any that are so old that I have to rephotograph them. I try to think about it - what is it that attracts me? Is it the shock of the color or the value against a background? Is it the way there seems to be SO MANY repetitions of a shape, a dot, a splotch, something that looks like miniature lettuce? Is it the mystery of how they got here - with no roots? I have a sense that they are ancient, like ferns. I will look into it.

Wikipedia tells me: Lichens may be long-lived, with some considered to be among the oldest living organisms. Lifespan is difficult to measure because what defines the "same" individual lichen is not precise. Lichens grow by vegetatively breaking off a piece, which may or may not be defined as the "same" lichen, and two lichens can merge, then becoming the "same" lichen. An Arctic species called "map lichen" has been dated at 8,600 years, apparently the world's oldest living organism.

I am thinking about living things, all living things. I see lichen on stones, pink lichen, yellow dot lichen. I can’t stop painting it and its variations. Growth and change is everywhere. There is movement and interaction on every plane in every way. I think about the film “The Powers of Ten.” My body, the lichen “body,” the Earth’s body. The big picture and looking closely.