A Johnston winter usually arrives from the southeast, pushing up the Pocasset River valley, and by the time the first flakes reach Simmonsville the route is already drawn. MCM Landscape Management handles snow removal here — plowing, opening walks and doorways, and spreading salt and sand on the shaded stretches that hold ice past noon. The hills in this town are gentle enough to ignore in July and impossible to ignore at four in the morning; a drive that drops away toward the road wants its own approach. A storm night becomes a long circuit of familiar addresses, back and forth until the pavement shows black again. By daylight there is nothing to look at but bare asphalt and banks pushed neatly back off the corners, which is exactly the point.