Narrated version of post here. (It’s outdated, I’ll update if I can find time, the written version is more accurate!)

Edit: Since the election, I’ve become political just by breathing. I’ve always voted with as much knowledge and consideration to the issues as I knew how. I’ve always tried to vote with conscience toward my fellow humans.

I’m #queer, in so many senses of the word. I’m #pansexual, #kinky and #asexual. I’m autistic and I have no patience for Nazis. Oh wait, is that not politically correct?

Fuck it.

I’m real, and I write beautiful stories detailing love, grief, life and graphic, open door sex. Usually with more than two people.

If you’re looking for someone to follow who isn’t political, who isn’t going to be real in everything I do. Unfollow button is on the right.

If you’d like to know me better, for whatever reason, read my blog and interact with me on twitter or in the comments.

Now… to the meat of how I do Twitter.

I gotta say something about Twitter. (Which I adore). A couple things maybe, I’ll try not to rant (too badly).

I don’t auto-follow. I can’t if I want to keep seeing the peeps I want to see in my feed.

Until recently, I’d extend the hand of internet friendship pretty easily. Some unpleasantness made me close my DMs to all but mutuals and I no longer auto-follow at all. If you want a follow back you’ll have to interact quite a bit (talk at me!) to get a follow-back.

I also unfollow for unfollow with mutuals. It hurts me, because if we’ve been interacting and suddenly you UF me, I don’t understand it.

I used to try to tell people if I had to UF them, and wanted the same from others. Since the harassment issues, I’d still LIKE to do that (for others as well as receive that for myself) but in all reality, I will curate my space for an optimal feeling of safety and you should do the same however that works for you.

I follow a few people who aren’t mutuals, in some cases it’s me reaching out a hand of internet friendship (and that ends pretty quickly if it doesn’t feel like they want me around/following them/aren’t ever likely to follow back). Others I follow it’s because I fan-by like crazy about their work (usually authors, but I fan-by actors and musicians too). (Just a snippet of info for the authors, if you interact with me, I’m MUCH more likely to go out of my way to get the library to order your book. I’m more likely to post a review of your work on my site, and best of all, I’m much more likely to buy your book.)

I will unfollow for a number of reasons, mainly because twitter is ‘social’ media. I’m here for the ‘social’ aspect of it, not for numbers or a platform. Having people interested in my work of words and wanting to hear when the shorts and books are published is amazeballs, don’t get me wrong! At the end of the day though, I both want and need interaction from my tweeps. (It’s often the only adult contact I have ’til hubby gets home, writing and being a SAHM is lonely business to the adult mind, you know?)

If you’re not interacting with me in some way (or if I don’t obsessively fangirl your work) I’m very likely to stop following you. I’m on twitter to make connections with people and enjoy short conversations, not to get lots of followers. Obviously, more people who like what I say or what I write is awesome (it really is, so much) but that’s not why I’m so active on Twitter. (Oh, and I’m really active, feel free to mute me or unfollow if I clutter your feed too much, I announce all bookish stuff on facebook and my web page too) I’m also on twitter to learn more about this writing thing I do and connect with others crazy enough to do it (also fan-bying… mustn’t forget that. Wait… did I mention that already?) 🙂

I’ll unfollow someone if I can’t handle their viewpoints, I’ll unfollow if I can’t remember why I followed them (meaning they probably haven’t interacted with me recently).

If I have to ask myself who the heck you are when I see a post of yours in my feed? Um. UF is coming, even if we’re mutuals. Sorry.

This too, if we’ve been mutually following one another AND interacting, then *you* unfollow me? It hurts, I don’t understand it, and I’m likely to mute or unfollow you. Look, I get it, it’s incredibly hard to keep up with anything more than 3 or 4 hundred followers (At most) but, if we’ve been ‘friends’ and interacting, then you unfollow, it leaves me wondering what *I’ve* done. I’m well aware that this is likely because of my autistic nature, I tend to overanalyze everything. (really, it’s exhausting sometimes) but… it’s the way I work, and I’m fully accepting of myself.

Another thing I don’t do (mostly cause I just don’t understand it) is call out others for a retweet or a like or a follow. It makes me uncomfy. *I* don’t want to be publicly thanked for a retweet and honestly, it clutters up my notifications page terribly. So if I don’t ‘like’ a thank you, that’s why, I already have a lot of stuff on that page to go through and I want the conversations and connections, not the list of names, ya know?

Probably weird of me…

Here’s the last thing, we as writers are often cautioned against following/unfollowing industry people or other authors. I need to say something about this.

When we enter contests, we’re encouraged to follow all the judges/organizers/agents involved. That makes my twitterfeed explode. I can’t keep up with the peeps I want to. So I selectively follow, those I’m *interested* in. By interested, in this context, it means just that, I’m interested and would like to know that person better. Half of the authors I follow I can’t/don’t even read their books for one reason or another. (Not my genre usually, or it’s only mono romance and gah… I’ve had enough mono romance to last me forever. I’ll still occasionally buy and read one, but the premise, details or writing has to be different enough to anything else I’ve read before to make it interesting.)

Building a tribe of writer-y peeps who get how crazy this thing we do is… wow, highly important to me. I might choose to follow a person because I think I can learn from them, rarely if I think they might be interested in what I write and only so I can figure out if they are a fit for me (twitter is fantastic for getting to know someone) or I support something they do/are doing (writing diverse stories for instance). As for agents, I follow a number of them that I can’t or won’t query, for one reason or another, simply because I like who they are. Some of them don’t rep what I write, some have strict length rules and anyone who knows me knows I write long… so.

When it comes to unfollowing, esp author/mentor/judges, I know it’s not ‘nice’ but if we haven’t connected in a social sense, if we haven’t interacted, I’ll eventually unfollow.

If I’ve followed a fellow author through a contest, and we’ve interacted, especially a lot, and I keep on keeping on getting the track notification saying they’re still not following me, then if the interaction drops off, yeah, you guessed it, unfollow.

My feed is a place I go to for fun, and honestly, the longer I’m on twitter, the more I’m learning what makes it fun for me, and what hurts me.  Me following people I’m interested in (unless they’re uber famous and probably aren’t checking their own feed in any case) the person interacting with me, then not following… yeah, it hurts, so I don’t do it much. Or I stop doing it when it starts hurting.

I’m weird, I know. I’m good with being me in all facets of me.

Just in case anyone is curious about how I do Twitter… thems are the whys.

Now. More editing, cause that just never ends.