Late in the day the Hudson at Stillwater turns the color of pewter, and the light comes in low across the flats where corn and lawns share the same good river-bottom ground. Paul's Lawn Care mows and trims through that hour and every other one, moving between village lots on the hill and the wider yards out along the back roads. Grass on this land grows with real ambition in June and asks for patience by August; either way it gets cut clean and bordered true. A finished lawn looks best in that slanting evening light — stripes settled, edges crisp, nothing left behind on the driveway. It's a good way to end a day's work, and a good thing to drive past afterward.