Hop Brook runs down the eastern edge of Middlebury toward the Naugatuck, and the maples along it go loud by the middle of October. Tom's Lawn Care finishes the mowing season under that color — last cuts, trimming, edging, leaves pulled off the lawn — and then waits on the other job. Winter here means plowing driveways and shoveling walks on roads that wind and climb, sometimes twice in a night. The pleasure of both trades is identical: arrive to a mess, leave order behind. Four full seasons pass over this town, and every one of them needs somebody with a machine and a plan.