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If all I really ended up doing was inserting "feminist" into my Twitter profile, that would have been quick and easy. That doesn't even sound like something that would happen to me.

I guess it was because I was thinking I should update Facebook too, and was there a spot for that? There are specific places for schools and jobs and religion. I could like a Feminism page, I guess, but that seemed insufficient.

I had not been thrilled with Timeline, and it made some things harder to find, but there was a little paragraph, and I could add it there. Fine, but because I had remembered the drop-down menu for religion, that had me thinking that I should add LDS to my Twitter profile. I blame that on Orson Scott Card.

I have read Ender's Game, and while I did not exactly like it, I did think it was well-written. Some time after reading it, Card started doing a newspaper column that I really liked. It was sensible and down to earth, and I grew to like him from that, though it ended quite a while ago. Honestly, I knew nothing about the National Organization for Marriage until recently. I had kind of heard about the Superman thing, but I wasn't really paying attention until now.

The only reason Card's non-apology isn't the worst non-apology out there is because Paula Deen beat him to it. I never cared for her, though, and I liked him, so I am really disappointed. More to the point, right now he is the Mormon getting all the press, with Romney before that. I am not comfortable with this representation.

Currently there are a few rampantly religious people going around and encouraging the depressed. It should be a good thing, but they are so aggressive about it that it is kind of a turnoff, especially for some of the people they are trying to help, many of whom have issues with religion. I don't want to be like that, but just putting it in my profile seemed like a reasonable compromise. It's not a secret, I'm not ashamed of it, but also I will not shove it in your face. And I ended up using Mormon instead of LDS because that is more familiar to people.

And then I just started changing things to stick with the character limit but still represent me.  Twitter really pushes you toward the concise. Whereas previously I had said "Aspiring screenwriter, frequent blogger", well, those are mostly still true, except that I feel really disheartened about ever selling a screenplay, so I am rewriting Family Blood as a novel, plus working on the musical and writing monthly comics now, as well as the occasional song, and it ultimately came down to just "Writer." I am a writer.

Part of that is the music writing, with the reviews. Maybe that's why it felt necessary to put "Rocker." That sort of feels like delusions of grandeur again, but rock needed to be there. As much as I love music in general, rock is most important. Not mentioning rock would be a lie. Putting rock as something I do does seem like a bit of a stretch, but have you seen me at karaoke? I don't know, it felt right.

These first changes left out comic books, and that seemed wrong. They are kind of part of me now. It also left out travel and animals. Maybe you can't fit everything in, but some things are so basic. How much of my essence could be boiled down to 140 characters?

My previous bio said "Will help with school but you still need to do the work." That was too long a way of saying that, and yet it was important. The first teen who befriended me on Twitter did so because of My Chemical Romance, but our first conversation was me helping her prepare for a test on Romeo and Juliet, and giving her ideas for different ways of looking at the characters. That was really cool. But still, you need to put in some effort; I'm not going to do your assignment for you. And I was not leaving out the claw machines!

And as much as I started this for entertainment, the connecting with people has been the most important thing. Keeping an eye out for people who need some help has meant a great deal to me, and I keep finding that I am cared about too, and that there are people looking out for and interested in me. It's been profound. The old admonition, "Be there for people" was going, but something needed to take its place.

I finally ended up with this:

Gina Harris
@sultryglebe

Writer. Rocker. Feminist. Mormon. Loves animals, travel, books, comic books, & sketch pads. Good at claw machines, answering questions, and caring about people.

Aloha, OR · sporkful.blogspot.com


Related posts:
http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2011/12/hometown-howdies.html
http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2012/07/affiliated.html