Guthrie Center holds a particular quiet once the leaves are down, the Middle Raccoon River running low and clear past the edge of town, and Lakeside Landscapes, LLC works through that quiet clearing driveways and walkways before the courthouse square opens for the day. Springbrook State Park isn't far outside town, and the crew has learned to watch the sky the way anyone does out here — clouds building over the timber to the west usually mean a storm is a few hours out, time enough to get ahead of it rather than behind. Guthrie County's hills roll harder than the flat ground farther north, so drifts collect in the low spots along the river valley while the ridgetop farms blow nearly bare, two different jobs from one storm. There's a particular kind of satisfaction in a walkway cleared edge to edge along these older streets, ice broken and hauled off before anyone's boots find it first. By the time Guthrie Center's few businesses unlock their doors, the ground underfoot has already been taken care of.