A July storm can cross Montgomery County overnight and leave Nokomis steaming by breakfast, every lawn in town an inch taller than it was at supper. Opperman Hardscape starts early on those mornings, working the shaded older streets first while the dew still holds the dust down. Mowing, trimming around porch steps and light poles, edging along the drive — the kind of attention that reads from the sidewalk without announcing itself. Twice a year the work changes shape: the spring clearing-out, and the autumn gathering when the maples let go all at once and the gutters fill. Yards in town and the places out along the section roads toward Coalton and Hillsboro get the same careful pass.