Yup. As the title says. As of today, the 5th of December 2018, I have been on FA for 10 years.

And what kind of 10 years those have been. They were...yeah I can truly say, that those past 10 years have been amazing for me and I have truly been shaped by them, probably more strongly by the 10 before those.

You have to see, my trip into the fandom was quite modest in its start. In the beginning it was just me testing the waters, without even really knowing what I was doing. I found FA and similar sites more by accident. I was looking (forgot the reason) for those latex masks you could glue to your face, you know, those professional things used in theater and movies. And over these secret searches (was using the family computer, horribly afraid others could see my online history on their accounts) , I landed on websites with anthro photomanipulations.

I was of first quite perplexed, not having thought I could find such stuff. But I was intrigued, so I searched some more, soon finding more...explicit art. I was more intrigued, so I kept on searching all in secret.

Luckily soon I got my own PC at that point, so I could search more freely, but I was still afraid of being discovered.

Over the weeks, months and years of searching I finally came onto various websites of drawn anthro art, climbing from there with link from website to website. Felt a bit like that must have felt how people worked in the 90s on the internet.

I recall finding the websites of Foxfire, I think someone was called Chris Sawyer, somebody called Foxx, who unfortunately has shut down his website by now, and probably many more, which I cannot recall anymore now.

Yet finally I came onto Transfur, where probably one of the earliest findings was Picklejuice (I think he goes by the same name here on FA). I recall quite well, as he had a Dragon TF posted, which I secretly printed out and coloured on my own deep at night. Should still have those coloured pages around some place.

Other websites I can recall are http://taurinfox.com/ and http://www.furry.org.au/Drhoz/furry.....phins0003.html

And over Transfur I found Yiffstar, the first time where I found the word 'Yiff', and I found out pretty fast what it meant. Read my first furry stories there, gotten my first real boners off on furry erotica. Battled with my sexuality, such stuff.

ANd finally I found Furaffinity. A place...so big, that it scared me back then. I knew nobody, I had no idea really what the website was about, I only knew there was various kinds of art I liked, so I made an account, just to be able to see it. That allready was a bit hurdle for me doing that, as I was afraid of making myself present online. But I managed.

For a few yeras I stayed low. Like super low. No faves. No comments. No watches. Nothing. I was just so ultra afraid of any kind of interactions with others, I only looked, and saved some pictures on a DS card or USB drive.

But then I saw a screenshot from TES Morrowind, about a mod. And I was intriguiged again. I knew we had the game and I wanted to know the mod, where it came from. So I took all my courage and sent my first note to the person who posted it, to find out where it was from. And I got a note back! That really surprised me, I truly did not expect to get an answer, after all, why should anybody answer to such a thing on the internet. That is how I thoguht.

From there I started to make slow gentle contact with others. I started finally to fave, and even comment. Short small modest comments. Over these my first online friendships started.

I won't name any specific people here, because you awesome people know who you are.

As I said, first online frienships and aquaintances. Some encouraged me to get a messenger programm, the MSN messenger. Yeah that is how far back that was. I was excited, my first real-time chatting online. Then I made a skep account and over time I made many many many amazing friends.

Then over one summer, I dunno how it evolved anymore, my first furry story evolved in my mind. Within a few weeks I had it all written down, spending hours deep into the night during my summer vacation to write it with my basic school English.

And then when the day came to post it... I had a panic attack. I can stil recall it. I sat there, breath shallow and so afraid to push that final button to publish it on FA. I had to talk to myself out loud, saying that there were worse and shorter and worse written stories on FA, so nobody would say anything bad about my stories. Yet that is how afraid again I was. But I fought with mysself and pushed that mouse button. And with that push, something in my mind shattered. My inhibitions probably, because after that, I became so much more outgoing.

Over the months after that I also started to ponder about my Fursona. At first I thought about a husky, black, white and blue. There is even a picture by Endium, a mass-pic with many more people, where my sona (hidden under a suit-mask) is shown as a husky. But then I felt it did not fit really and changed it to dragon.

From there I did slow research on how to get a paypal account because I decided I wanted and needed real art. Yeah, that is how I felt, like a spy , hiding from family, to find out how to buy things online.

Folks, I am so damn happy I did this all. Because after getting finally some first pics, more and more amazing people wanted to talk with me. With this a local fur even invited me over to his place. Again, took all my courage to bring myself to visit him. And then he invited me to a local furdance, again, more courage to gather.

I could go on here for hours, but I wanted to tell every single one of you, whose path has crossed with mine...

Thank you. Truly thank you from the bottom of my heart and soul. Every singleone of you made a difference for me for the best. You made me stronger, you gave me ideas, you made me laugh, and yes, sometimes cry, but I grew stronger from all of this made me stronger. I was not so much afraid anymore. I know, so many people say how toxic the fandom is, and I admit I probably was lucky to have avoided that all. But to me, the Fandom and all those people I met were like a Therapy for me.

I managed to see the world through your eyes, each interaction with you opened the world more to me. And you still keep doing this, every single day!

So....thank you. You all. You all amazing people all over this planet. Thank you again and again.

Oh, and this picture was done by   LUWOLVESCAS (Yeah, he is still around at times)