April reaches the ravines around Danville first, redbud lighting the wooded slopes while the yards in town are still brown and flat. Evergreen lawn care starts the season right there — the first cut of the year, winter's litter raked out, beds trimmed back to a bare edge. Everything after that first mowing is momentum; a lawn touched early keeps its color and its habit clear through the summer. Weekly cutting, trimming and edging are unglamorous work, and they are exactly what does it. By Memorial Day you can tell from the street which yards got the head start.