By October the brick streets around the Madison County courthouse square lie papered in sycamore and oak, and Edwardsville makes its slow coppery turn toward the cold. Slemmer Landscape & Design spends that stretch behind blowers and rakes, with a truck that fills faster than anyone expects — leaves lifted off the turf before they mat down and smother it, beds cut back, lawns handed into winter in good order. The rest of the year runs steadier: mowing on a rhythm, edges held sharp where grass meets drive and walk, trimming close along foundations and fence posts. It is an old town with old trees, and some of these yards have root systems older than the houses standing over them. The pleasure is in leaving a place composed — the sort of yard a neighbor glances at twice on the way past.