Late in the day the light comes off the Delaware sideways, and every fresh-cut stripe on a New Hope lawn goes the color of straw. Best Buddies Landscaping works those hours — mowing, edging clean along the walks, trimming back whatever leans out over the path, then hauling the clippings off before the evening damp settles in. Come December the same yards answer to different names, driveway and stair and sidewalk, and the plow goes on: lanes opened wide, steps shoveled down to the tread, the shaded strips treated where ice holds on past noon. Weather in this valley rarely announces itself; it slides up the river and lands all at once. The work is to be ready on both ends of the year, for New Hope and the towns strung along River Road.