Twitter Love Story: Tweets bring two homeless bloggers together

Twitter is amazing and unusual in that it has opened our eyes to new things we would potentially never have experienced before.

Such as breaking news stories before even the media has gotten hold of the information, coverage of a Moldovian revolution, inside details about the life and loves of Stephen Fry and, more recently, a topless shot of Lindsay Lohan....?!

It's truly a special place....

Now following all of the above, a little Twitter romance doesn't seems especially out of place, there are even Twitter dating sites popping up such as MyTweetheart.com and Twitterbirds.com, but there is one recent romance on Twitter that has captured the hearts of Twitterers worldwide....the transatlantic love story of two homeless people named Bri and Matt.

Now, you might be thinking, how the hell does a homeless person have access to Twitter or the internet or even a computer?! Well, as it turns out, using internet cafes they can access just as regularly as we do.

Mark was made homeless during March of 2008 following a sequence of events which were largely beyond his control. He had worked all of his life, he was a homeowner and did not have alcohol or substance abuse issues. He was computer literate and was a writer and a blogger who used Twitter.

Mark began to write about being homeless on his blog 'Homeless Tales' and also started to monitor Twitter using Summize to alert him (via RSS)to any tweets containing 'homeless' or homelessness'. And this is how one homeless guy got to meet a homeless girl on the other side of the Atlantic and fall in love.

In March 2009, Mark was alerted via Summize to his usual tweets containing 'homeless' or 'homelessness' and became aware of a Twitterer called @tGGtH with tweets such as "“If a turtle has no shell is it naked or homeless?” and, “Just saw a homeless guy with a cell phone. WTF?”

The connecting URL to @tGGtH was http://girlsguidetohomelessness.com/ - tips for surviving homelessness. You may be homeless, but you do not need to be a bum!

Mark started to read the blog and discovered what he described as "a young, intelligent woman, newly homeless and whose writing I found highly engaging and witty. She was following exactly nine people on Twitter and had just received her very first follow - me".

@tGGtH was also known as 'Bri'.

Bri was alone and homeless in a trailer with no heating, running water or cooking facilities living in California. Mark was living 5,000 miles away in Scotland but, as Mark had often done with other homeless people, he felt the urge to reach out to her.

Within a few hours of their first tweets they were exchanging direct messages which would soon progress to email and then instant messenger. Before they knew it, they were conducting an online affair, though niether had ever met in person, and found themselves falling in love.

After a few months of online conversing, Mark made the leap and travelled to California where he remains currently, but only for another 2 weeks before he must make his way home to Scotland.

They both work but financially it has been difficult for them and they have spent most of their time staying in a small, cheap motel.

Soon Mark will be back in Scotland and Bri will return to her trailer situated in a wal-mart parking lot.

However, they have such a positive outlook that they say "Those few niggles aside though, we are both blissfully happy and madly in love. Most importantly, thanks to Twitter, we are together".

Such a lovely heartwarming story.

You can find both of their blogs here which is where you can read about the rest of their story:

http://homelesstales.com/
http://girlsguidetohomelessness.com/



UPDATE:

@tGGtH found me on Twitter! How nice...