I made a promise to myself that after Twitter-enjoying the week of Biden's inauguration (as best I could), I would say my goodbye from it.

I have met some amazing people here. I've tormented Ted Cruz as best I could.

But along the way, a couple of things became clear.

First, I'm not necessarily in control of my Twitter habit, and that's never a good feeling. I don't like the idea that I *have* to check Twitter. This service *is* addictive. It wouldn't have lasted so long if it weren't.

Second, I loved working on Chernobyl in relative isolation from premature feedback. The audience is everything to me, and I think about them all the time... but Twitter attention-- especially to stuff I'm actively working on in the moment-- can be stifling at times.

That said, I am very grateful for Twitter for all sorts of stuff, including meeting people I might not have otherwise known.

But mostly?

Teaching me things. I learned a lot. Even from those who were harsh. Twitter can either make you crueler and haughtier, or more empathetic.

Twitter has made me more empathetic, especially to people who aren't white, who aren't straight, who aren't American, who aren't men, who aren't what used to be blithely called "the norm."

That's been a Good thing.

Take care of each other! Twitter life is exciting at times, bewildering at times, enlightening at times... but so is regular life.

Regular life is superficially more boring than Twitter, but it's also substantively more meaningful by many orders of magnitude.

To (regular) life!