The Cal-Sag Channel keeps a black seam of open water through Palos most of the winter, steaming a little on the coldest nights while everything around it locks up. Brothers Landscaping Design works those nights — plowing lots and drives, shoveling stoops and walks, spreading salt where the melt runs and refreezes by four in the morning. A clipper comes down off the plains fast in this part of Cook County, three inches before anyone announced it, and the answer is simply to be out in it early. A cleared lot with its windrows squared off along the edges and the pavement dark and drying is worth every hour it takes. That is the whole aim of the night, and it does not get done any other way.