South of town the ground goes flat and open, corn and beans running to the horizon with nothing to slow the sunrise. That first light is the working hour here — grass still cool, dry enough to cut clean and throw even. Mowing, string trimming along fences and foundations, edging where turf creeps onto the walk, and clearing the clippings so nothing mats down behind the machine. By noon, when the heat has stacked up over the Rock River, a row of Dixon yards sits squared away and quiet. The route runs from the neighborhoods off Galena Avenue out to the section roads toward Nelson and Harmon.