Fog sits in the Sangamon bottoms north of Springfield on winter mornings, and behind it the cold has already turned yesterday's melt to glass. Plow routes start long before the first shift is due anywhere: driveways opened end to end, lot entrances cut wide, walks scraped to concrete and treated across the entryways where ice sets in and stays. Wind over that open ground can refill a drive within the hour, so a long storm gets worked twice, sometimes three times. Snow goes where it will melt off the pavement instead of back onto it. The reward is dull and complete — black concrete at six in the morning, and a car that goes where it is pointed.