A clipper comes down off the lakes and finds nothing in Westland to slow it down — no ridge, no bluff, just the long flat of old Nankin farm ground laid out now in ranch houses and wide driveways. That is the hour TLT LawnCare & SnowRemoval LLC is already awake, headlights swinging onto Wayne Road while the signals still blink over an empty street. Plowing, then the walk to the front door shoveled down to concrete, then salt where the midday melt will set up again after dark: the work is done before the first shift reaches for a coat. Come June the blades come off and the mowers go on, and the job turns into rhythm — the cut, the trimmed fence line, the edge along the drive laid straight enough to sight down. Spring and fall the cleanups carry off whatever the wind and the silver maples leave behind. It is a plain sort of pride, and Westland is a plain-spoken town: a driveway you can back out of at five in the morning, a lawn that reads well from the sidewalk.