Evanston keeps half its working life in the alleys — the brick lanes running behind the two-flats off Dempster, where garage doors stand open and the cans line up along the fences. That is where a mowing day starts: gate latch, engine, boots on wet pavement, before the Purple Line has really begun to fill. Al Gomez Landscaping works the small deep yards on these blocks, mowing, trimming and edging until every strip of grass stops in a clean line against the concrete. When autumn comes the crew returns for cleanups, after the yards go copper overnight and the wind packs everything into the fence corners. It is unshowy work with a plain reward — a lawn that looks looked-after, on a street where everybody walks past it twice a day.