For the majority of my life, I've found myself drawn to non-human characters. I started playing Dungeons and Dragons in elementary school, and I was constantly making lizardfolk and werecat and dragonkin characters. When I first played The Elder Scrolls, my first character was an Argonian. My second was a Khajiit. In truth, I've never played as any of the other races in either Oblivion or Skyrim.
When it comes to the furry fandom, I've known about it since my teens, but haven't really delved much into it until now. I would always see furry artwork on the internet, and I always thought it was cool and interesting. Every now and then, the thought would cross my mind: "I could probably get into that..."
My first big exposure to the furry community was when I discovered
Renard and his music. I've always loved electronic, so I was instantly drawn to his work, which now dominates my iTunes library. I grew familiar with each of his fursonas, listening as each one evolved in his/her style. I've spoken with him several times online, and I've even gotten the opportunity to participate in the production process of one of his songs (I'm part of the guest choir on "Wanderlust" by The Quick Brown Fox).
It was only very recently that I began to identify myself as a furry. I think the process truly picked up steam when I was shopping online for a christmas gift for my mate. I was specifically looking for one of those hats with animal faces on them—an owl, in particular. I knew it would remind her of me, since they're my favorite birds, and I've been known to post owl-like emoticons very often. (•,•) Anyway, as I was shopping, I saw in the related items a picture of a fox-eared hat. Intrigued, I clicked on it, and found a plethora of eared hats made by the same person. There were foxes, cats, dogs, wolves, etc. After searching through them, I became torn between the red fox hat, and a grey wolf one. I sent the pictures to a friend of mine, asking her which one she thought I should get. She said quite confidently that I seemed much more fox-like to her than wolf-like. Her reasoning was that I valued cunning over strength or aggression; that I was more the type to hold back, observe, and outwit than the type to use force and aggression. I couldn't argue with her; upon a brief introspection I found that everything she said was absolutely true. So I added the fox hat to my order along with my mate's owl hat.
I was ecstatic when it arrived. I wore it throughout the entirety of the following day, even though the weather wasn't quite cold enough for it. I got strange looks from other students at my university, but I didn't care. I was enjoying myself far too much.
That night, I was walking across campus after a rather long study session. I came to a lonelier area of the school grounds when I saw somebody pull up and park. There was nobody else around, and I suddenly felt like not being noticed. I ducked down behind a small hill, and furtively watched as the person got out of their car and started walking toward one of the dorms. All this while I was still wearing my fox ears. To put it simply, I felt like a fox. It was a different feeling, but a good one nonetheless.
Several days later, I was contemplating what I might look like if I was an anthro fox. After much deliberation, I finally got out an old piece of notebook paper and a pencil, and sketched out the fursona you see in my avatar. It was at that point that I finally decided that I was a furry. After that, I began chatting with other furries on Omegle, hoping to dip my feet into the waters of the fandom. I met many a friendly fur there, but I didn't feel like I was building any significant friendships with any of them. So today I decided to finally venture into the realm of this forum.
A furry I most certainly am.
Topic: How did YOU become furry? =) (Read 140391 times)