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- Pando challenges our way of thinking about the individual and the community. Human societies and forests presume complexity and plurality; myriad entities interacting, sometimes for their very survival. People, like Pando, tout their uniqueness, their independence. They are simultaneously reliant on community connections. Even in the American West, where the myth of the isolated pioneer or lone gunslinger has fueled many cinematic legends, far-flung settlements were exceedingly dependent on communal support to survive harsh conditions. Likewise, the ecological “strategy” of large aspen clones is to support one another. No stem is truly separate from the larger clone. In the words of my friend Rich Binell, Pando is “a forest of one tree.”