At four in the morning, US-10 through Farwell is a tunnel of falling snow with two taillights somewhere out ahead of you. Elm Creek Lawn & Landscape LLC works that hour, plowing drives and lots, salting the slick spots and clearing walks so the first shift never has to think about any of it. When the thaw finally takes hold, the same trucks turn to lawn work — mowing on a schedule, trimming the edges, opening beds in spring and stripping the leaves out come October. A yard in Clare County only gets so many green weeks, which is reason enough to keep every one of them looking sharp. It is a plain living, done in the dark half the year and the daylight the other.