Elevation is the first fact of life here: a driveway in Aspen Springs can climb a hundred feet before it reaches the door, and in January that climb decides whether you go to work or stay home. Earthly Elevations plows those pitches around Pagosa Springs — drives, turnarounds and walkways cut back to solid footing. Uphill snow behaves differently than flatland snow; it slides, it creeps across the cut, and it has to be pushed to the right side of the grade so the next storm has somewhere to go. The reward is the sound of tires finding gravel on a morning the thermometer never got out of the single digits. Nothing dramatic about it — just a way back down the hill.