Mountain laurel breaks out white along the Winsted hillsides in June, right as the mowing season hits full stride — weekly cuts, close trim work around lamp posts and fence lines, beds edged and mulched. Better Blades Landscaping runs the yards up the Still River valley and the terraces above Route 8, where a lawn can lie flat for twenty feet and then drop away hard. Then the year turns over: those same routes get plowed, walks shoveled and sanded, and the driveway opened a second time after the town truck packs the apron shut. Storms in this corner of Connecticut land heavier than they do downstate, so the phone rings at strange hours and gets answered. A cleared drive at five in the morning is a small, whole thing to take pride in.