Fursona Timeline

There were sooo many notes that were impossible for me to fit on my fursona timeline, so I figured it deserved it's own post!! I'm just going to go through each entry individually and expand on them a bit, special shout-out to Anna for compiling all the dates for me!

I'll probably have way more to say about some than others cause admittedly my amnesia for these periods of my life is pretty significant. But first I wanted to give some background as to why I even decided to do this!

It's been no secret to me that when I was younger I went through A LOT of distinct sonas in a fairly short amount of time...it's amusing and also very interesting to me now, cause this was probably one of the most external indicators of my lifelong battle with the question "Who are you"! Making this timeline really helped me to put everything into perspective...it was also cathartic to revisit these guys in a playful context after trying my hardest to not dwell on my past.

Calemore was admittedly more than just a sona to me during my childhood...she started as an OC I made based on my siamese Webkinz (that I still have to this day!) and she evolved into a full blown identity adopted to interact with my friends. We would exclusively refer to each other by our "character" names and we saw each other as the animals we role played as to the point that hissing, purring, and scratching the air at each other became our own sort of language. (I still vividly remember the time one of us got For Real sad to be hissed at. It wasn't a joke!!!) I do miss it somewhat... Even if I was never a cat internally, it's probably the only time in my life I felt my animal identity was respected in some way. 

The inclusion of the butterfly was at first just a mindless addition, but lo and behold when I actually looked through my childhood sketchbook, I was shocked to see I made an unintentional throwback ;_; 

The thing on her back is in fact cheese. Why? Well. Apparently my childhood friends and I thought cheese was the funniest thing on earth and it came up quite a bit in the comics I made for us, so I would have failed child me if I didn't include it somewhere. (Silver was one of my friends at the time- not to be confused with my cat, also named Silver LMAO.) Sorry for my handwriting. Hopefully this is somewhat legible.

Nightshade was my first sona based around my very first username online, Nightshade314. I'd just been a passive internet explorer until now! This sona marked me taking the big step into having a presence and posting art and making friends. She is a black and purple demon wolf with red eyes and raven's wings... I have a soft spot for her still despite the bad memories that come attached. She is such a perfect time capsule of the kinds of sparkle dog mary sue-esque designs that were popular with kids in the early 2010s. I am so sorry for what happened to you sweetie you deserved better. Also I am begging you, the audience, to please remember both corvids and wolves, it will be on the test later-

Typhon is one of the sonas I don't have much to say about despite me apparently drawing him A LOT. My only he/him sona which was interesting, when you consider the guy who was hosting at the time is the only one in the collective that uses those pronouns now lmao. He was originally an adopt I believe...and I just grew really attached to him. He was mute, and communicated exclusively through his bandana which could change to display anything he wanted! I was surprised to still feel fondness for this guy while drawing him, though, I don't own him anymore. He's enjoying a nice retirement with a mutual of mine. Rest easy king. 

God. This bear. Ok so there was a lot going on here, a lot of it mildly embarrassing. Bearshade is kind of an enigma to me....Bears were never really an animal I thought much about! I like them, I think they're cool, but other than that they are not high on the list of animals I like to think about, so the fact she exists at all is crazy to me. (I say this while there is a tree kangaroo on the list which is an animal I hadn't even known EXISTED until I made a sona out of it, so maybe I should be taking pointers on how to step out of my comfort zone from kid me!) I remember bearshade being the face of my old Tumblr account when it was just starting to get a tiny bit of attention- and that was exclusively because this was my self-shipping era LMAO. If you didn't immediately recognise the hoodie- then I suppose I'll have to spill the beans. I had a massive crush on Karamatsu from Osomatsu-san back in the day...his fail-swag allured me I suppose... and I made a tiger OC that was heavily based on him to ship with Bearshade. I own neither of these guys now, otherwise I would have fetched images for you, so you'll just have to trust me on this! And oh- the knife was included because apparently she was also a yandere too sometimes?...I was 16 at the time so I get it tbh. 

Erebuuus. My first foray into having a monstersona :') This guy is still privately listed as a sona in my toyhouse which is a huge feat! It means I don't mind looking at them, and I still like them as a character even though they don't feel like "me" anymore! Erebus was a very important sona to me because they helped me come to terms with my nonbinary identity! I made them an androgynous shapeshifter and a huge light bulb went off in my head. I believe this was the time I added "they/them" to my bio as a secondary set of pronouns and it just felt so affirming...to be represented by a thing, a beast, a monster!! I love you Erebus!!

I don't remember much about Raven other than the fact that she sure did exist which is crazy considering how long I had her! She was such an impulse design, like I said before, I made her the same day I learned what a tree kangaroo was just because I wanted to have a unique sona. For my timeline, I took the liberty of drawing her more accurate to what tree kangaroos look like, but back in the day I drew her very cutesy and...stylised I guess? I hate referencing it this way, but you know the SU bean head shape? Yeah pretty much that. Ok we're done here. 

Artemis was a weird one. A good weird though! I would say this is the time I started having a smidgen less shame online and embraced being weird and self-indulgent because it was fun! They were an alien Sphynx cat with a more insectoid alien form they sometimes turned into. TBH I am surprised by how short of a time I utilised her, because she was really fun for me to draw now...

Did you remember corvids? For the test? So from this point onwards is when my alters started influencing sonas. I first bought this design as an adopt back in 2015 and sat on it for 2 years before utilising it as a sona! The initial vibe was palpably different than what you're seeing here now. When I first got this character they were a top hat and bow-tie wearing goofball that loved their friends. (The top hat in my above drawing makes sense now I hope! ⤵️)

Something happened along the way though...I started having moments where it felt like I was fighting with myself for control of my life and how I wanted to present myself online. I would get the feeling that the "me" that I was, was wrong...and that I needed to break through my skin to free the "actual me" trapped inside. I would make accounts and go by a different name completely for a day or two before coming to my senses and deleting everything and pretending that never happened. You get the drill! At some point, I drew this image pretty abruptly. 

As you can see, it is a complete departure from how they were normally drawn- and from roughly then on, this sona wasn't "mine" anymore. If you're nosy and poke around our site (Or just glance to the right if you're on desktop LOOOL) it's really easy to guess which of us is responsible for this!

CMYK9 was an adopt I got that became a vehicle to process abuse and toxic dynamics I'd been in. Growing up, there has always been an angry protective presence in the peripherals of my brain that distinctly took the form of a large black "beast" with red eyes- first taking the shape of a dragon, and then slowly morphing to a canid over time. It only felt right for this new sona, a large black dog, to be representative of the righteous fury this part of my brain felt. Interestingly, when drawn with another character (A lamb OC, not featured in this lineup), it took the role of the aggressor in the relationship, but when drawn alone it was depicted as unstable, self-destructive, and fearfully aggressive, in the way an abused animal is. I'm going to be so real with you, this is pretty much beat for beat a description of that member of the collective, one that isn't really active online nor has much of an opinion on what we do here. The host at the time depicted this sona in the way he did without really knowing why it felt so cathartic and affirming. Oh, and the CMYK was also a HUGE reason I felt like I had to get this adopt RIGHT NOW. CMYK has been heavily enmeshed in my identity and trauma processing for so long...pretty much since I got online!

Azzy!! I love this guy still to this day! :} Another adopt turned sona, he's so delightfully weird to me, and is an example of what some people call an "idealized sona", so not really me, but what I aspired to be at the time. He's rowdy, hedonistic, loving, and not afraid to take up space...we really couldn't be more different!!! In the past I looked up to people who were unashamedly strange...I thought that was the only way an identity could be valid, if you yelled it from the rooftops, but over time I've realised that's just not who I am. I am the lone tree that falls in the forest, and yes, I make a sound even when no one's around to witness it. At this stage of my life, I am extremely content with being an odd, elusive animal who needs no ones validation but my own. The only other thing I'll say about Azzy is fascinatingly enough, he briefly made me feel more connected to my blackness. Black Panther came out in February of 2018. Say what you will about Marvel, I'll agree with you, but that film was really important to a lot of us for being the first movie in the MCU with a black director, black lead, and majority black cast. After seeing that film and feeling the excitement online from black peers, I felt proud to be black. Pathetic I know, you'll have to forgive me. My skin color is not really allowed to be a point of pride for me all that often, but that was one of the times in my life that I felt special to be me just as I was. I projected those feelings onto Azrael at the time. So basically what I'm saying dear reader, is that Azzy would get the pass. 💯

Baby....,sweetums...little thang...my shayla... IT'S ME!!......SORT OF? Guttz is my current online face claim! It's an eldritch horror that takes the form of a maggot-like creature to cause problems on purpose. The only other sona I've had this long was Calemore so you know this is the real deal. I think I really like Guttz so much because in true mascot fashion, its design is very simple and versatile! And it helps that it's attached to my favourite public internet identity I've had since I've been online. I've heard other creators express similar sentiments before, but I think of Guttz as both me and not me...it's me, but marketable. Palatable. I simply don't think it's safe or smart to be fully vulnerable on social media outside of like. DMs with someone you trust. Not to be asocial on main, but strangers online are not your friends and they will chew you up and spit you out so don't give them a full hand to deal from. Guttz is the colorful armor I wear, and I love it for protecting me and giving me a vessel to explore this place I (sometimes begrudgingly) call home!

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, we have Guttz with that dawg in em. Or rather, it's that dawg with Guttz in em- since the lore here is that Guttz is a parasite that's able to use dead animals as hosts and "corrupt" them as much as it wants! This was admittedly more alter shenanigans, but at the time, all I remember is that it was suddenly crucially important to have a public dog sona of some sort to play as online since CMYK9 had been retired to a private toyhouse folder. I compromised with this impulse by still trying to rationalize it as a "form" of Guttz instead of making it its own thing....I still have fondness for this freak beast even though it came so out of left field. I was experimenting with a cartoonier style at the time, hence the exaggerated proportions. and IT WAS FUNN. I MISS IT TBH. I wouldn't mind still keeping them around just to draw sometimes, though...I'm not sure if it's sona material so much anymore. Thank you anyways my friend! 

WHEW OK. According to my stats, this is a 13 minute read! If you got this far, thank you so much for your time, I had a lot of fun reminiscing! In the future, talks about my art and my process will probably be exclusively in my gallery, but this one felt personal enough for my blog... Alright, see ya!