Bitten by the writing bug

Ana muses about maximizing the time she has to write, now that winter is over.

    I used to welcome spring, especially after moving to Minnesota. Winters here are long and harsh. The shades of green on the budding trees are much easier on the eyes than the reflective gray-whites of ice and snow.
    But since I became a writer, the equinox means I will have less time to compose my thoughts for six months.
    Work at the soup building gets busy as we fill orders for stores that cater to the influx of tourists and summer residents who seek tranquility in the northern woods and walleye in the deep blue lakes.
    My hubby needs help on the farm: today he summoned me to help raise a line of old fenceposts so he can reset them away from the sprawling pines that were barely knee high when he transplanted them into the windbreak row.  I wrapped the heavy chain around the base of each post and held tight while he raised the bucket on the tractor. The posts either broke off or came out. He has to get done, for next week the neighbor is delivering fifty heifers to graze for the summer.
    My garden needs tending. So far, I've direct seeded carrots, spinach, beets, baby lettuce, cilantro and potatoes. I transplanted 300+ onion plants, which I started indoors from seed. I still have tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, pickling cucumbers, zucchini, yellow squash and Red Kuri winter squash, basil, parsley, broccoli, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower and head lettuce in pots in flats that I set out every morning and carry indoors every evening. I still need to plant sweet corn. We're not out of frost danger yet. And I still have three 200-foot long rows of raspberries to prune of last-years' canes. Hands and knees work, with a side serving of thorns and scratches.
    Planting and pruning is just the beginning. There's the weeding, mulching, watering, deer-proofing, not to mention the picking, eating, canning and freezing. I savor the produce and love even more watching my grandkids delight in freshly pulled carrots and plucked berries.
    I know my muscles need the exercise, and my lungs need fresh air, but I still long to sit alone with my laptop and write. Indoors, because tick season turns into mosquito season turns into fly season.  
   And then there is a glorious month of fall colors, when hoses need to be rolled up. Pea fence and support posts taken down.
    Work can't be postponed for long here. The seasons turn relentlessly. I have to pay bills.
    When the edits for Stormy Hawkins finally come, I will get up earlier and stay up later. I will nail my back blurb, get up a website, set up a Facebook author page.
    You hear that, Spring? You came too soon. I've been bitten by the writing bug.