The first real mow of the year in Cheboygan comes in May, when the marsh out past the boardwalk finally green up and the gulls are loud over the water again. Spray's Landscape Services opens the season with the cleanup nobody enjoys and everybody needs: winter grit raked out of the turf, sand off the lawn edges, the matted leaf litter pulled out of the beds. After that comes the schedule — mowing, trimming, edging, week after week, so the yard is never playing catch-up. Edges get recut where the sod has crept over the concrete, and the drive is left swept rather than dusted with clippings. There is nothing like that first clean pass across a lawn that spent five months under snow.