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MFF memories
12 years ago
I've been reminded that I haven't written any journal entries in too many months, so here's an idea for a topic. Memories of my first furry convention, MFF in 2008.
2008 was kind of a the year of my full entry into convention life. I'd been to a science fiction convention many years earlier and had a great time, but that was with people that were familiar with the con and who were willing to kind of be my guides to how to do the whole con thing. I mean I was sharing a room with the guy who ran the dances every night. It was also in another state, so I had no local contacts for conventions out here. I'd heard of MFF before, but it felt rather intimidating and I never really considered going. At that point I was largely a solo furry, I was familiar with the fandom but had never talked to another furry and never really considered trying to. It just wasn't a social thing for me at that point.
But in 2008 I started off by going to my second sci-fi con, and a local one that time. I'd had a great time again, and the friend I'd gone with suggested going to MFF that year with me, even though he wasn't a furry. I think he'd had a good time at the one con and wanted to try another one, and was a little curious about seeing what a furry con would be like. Maybe he also wanted to push me to go to it because he thought I'd enjoy it.
It was an intense experience. I arrived in the parking lot and saw my first fursuiter walking around outside and realized I wanted to howl out in celebration. I was there, I was really doing it!
The enthusiasm ended as soon as I walked into the hotel. As soon as I entered all I could think of was how it was filled with people I didn't know, and yet who all seemed to know each other. Yes, I'm not the most socially adept, it was an intimidating experience. I told myself that it would be better that night at the parties. Because that's the thing about sci-fi cons, at night it's all about the parties. There's typically a designated party floor where people hold public room parties, it doesn't matter if you know anybody there or not.
I was discouraged when I didn't see any sign posts with promotions for room parties, which sci-fi cons always have, but I told myself that things just must be different there. Maybe they just weren't up yet. But they never came up. I never found any public parties, and now I know that most furcons specifically prohibit the one standard element of a room party that I was looking for, the room door being propped open to advertise it as a public party.
That night I was pretty upset. I was almost angry at myself. As I was brushing my teeth, I was telling myself that it was a mistake to go, and that I was an idiot for thinking it would be any different there. Just because they were furries didn't mean I'd find it any easier to fit in.
You have to understand how intimidating the social scene was. I could see that there were a number of cliques. The fursuiters hung out together, the artists hung out, and so on. Well I'm kind of a writer, but there was no writer clique. I actually did find a photographer clique to hang out with at a later MFF, but that year I didn't see it. There seemed to be nowhere for me. I felt like a total outcast somewhere that I expected to instantly belong.
That was Friday. So Saturday found me doing the panel thing, going to the events I wanted to see and trying to make the most of what I thought was going to be a lost cause. I don't really remember what I did that day, all I remember is that night when I attended the variety show. Actually I think it started with Uncle Kage's story hour, but I'm not sure. And suddenly I started to feel it. I still didn't know any of those people, but I was sitting in a sea of them, surrounded by them on all sides. We were all laughing at the same jokes, and I started to feel the shared experience.
And then later that night there was the dance. That blew my mind. I'm an odd one, I've liked electronic dance music for a long time but have never really been a dancer. I'm too inhibited. But to be there and to see everything that was going on was amazing to me. The lights and the sounds and all the moving colorful furry things were intoxicating. The thing that I couldn't get over was how everyone was doing something different. All these different dancing styles all intermingling, and somehow it all worked together.
And then it happened. I'd heard about DJs supposedly being masters at controlling the flow of emotion of the dance, of mixing the songs together to maximize the intensity of it, but that all kind of sounded like overblown nonsense to me. That is until the DJ playing at the time did this transition to a bit of rather obscure Jpop, and somehow I had the most intense experience of the convention. I wasn't even dancing, but just being there and hearing and seeing it all was enough. This wave of feeling washed over me, it's hard to explain but it basically was the feeling that I was there, I was experiencing it, I was living! Just one of those magic moments that you can't really understand, all you can do is feel it.
Eventually I had to call an end to the night. I had panels to do the next day and reluctantly left the dance. And that was when the disembodied robo llama head spoke to me. Umm.. yes. I can't remember what name he went by, but there was one super elaborate costume that was of a kind of cyborg llama, at least I think it was a llama. And apparently the head had a camera in it, and the owner had set it on the table by the dance doors. I walked up to it, and it called me by name and invited me to have some of the candy that was scattered about the table. "Come take some candy from a stranger" was how he worded it. So on that surreal note I headed back to my room.
The friend that I'd gone with was already in his bed, and I didn't want to wake him up. But somehow I ended up talking to him, almost shouting when my exuberance started spilling out. I couldn't help it, I was just so jazzed about how I felt. It was like a yoyo of emotion, after feeling so dejected the first day I had come all the way around to elation, and I just had to talk about it. I think he was laughing at me, and that was okay. I was ridiculous, I knew it even then. I didn't care. When you get a moment like that you don't question it, you just go along for the ride.
I looked for a copy of that DJ's set for months, but I never even knew who he was. Months later I finally found it, I was on my laptop in my bed and just winding down before I went to sleep. Then I hit that transition and it all came back to me, and I got so excited that I couldn't sleep for hours. He now goes by Audiodile, and I still watch his web site for any new sets.
Sunday was the usual bittersweet ending. I was walking around thinking how nothing really had changed, it's not like I'd suddenly fallen in with a group of people that I could easily socialize with, but at the same time I felt that sense of belonging. I'd seen a lot of amazing things, and I got my picture taken with this one fursuiter that I was kind of fond of.
And then on the drive back, I experienced PCD. Post Con Depression. Holy crap that was vicious. All I could think of was that the world looked so cold and grey. After being surrounded by brightly colored furry things I was suddenly surrounded by the bleak midwestern winter. I don't know how it hits anyone else, but I couldn't get over this feeling that life would never be okay again.
But I learned that a good night's sleep can do wonders. I woke up feeling much better, but still with the good memories of what I'd just been through.
I've built on that experience. I've been every year since then, and after I learned of a local furry group in my area from a stranger I roomed with in 2009 (who turned out to live about 5 minutes from me) I started going to their monthly bowling meets.
The MFF experience for me now is so different. For the past couple years it's been a case of walking around and having all these people call out to me. I know I always react weird, it's just that I have a really difficult time figuring out who they are. I have difficulty recognizing faces, and when I'm surrounded by so many strange faces it just kind of overloads me and I don't see the familiar ones. So if I go strangely blank when you greet me just understand, it totally is me, not you. I offended someone before who thought that my lack of response indicated that I didn't want to talk to him, and I feel terrible for that. It's just that it takes me a while to shift gears and get into the chit chat mode.
But believe me, it matters to me. It makes me feel like I belong. Okay, so I still don't know most of the people there. That's over a thousand people, of course I don't know them. But I'm amazed at how many people I do know, and who know me. I know a bunch from the local meets, I know a snow leopard fursuiter that I roomed with in 2009, and then there's this one girl who apparently I talked to initially in 2011. I don't remember at all, she says I was very drunk, and that part at least rings true. And yet she seems happy to see me every year, so it can't have gone that badly.
All you guys rock. You make MFF amazing for me every year. I should not be comfortable at an event this large, I should be running away screaming from it. Instead I feel like it's my event, I feel that confidence that comes from believing that you belong.
I invite anyone reading this to share a convention story of their own in the comments. I admit to being curious what these things are like for other people.
2008 was kind of a the year of my full entry into convention life. I'd been to a science fiction convention many years earlier and had a great time, but that was with people that were familiar with the con and who were willing to kind of be my guides to how to do the whole con thing. I mean I was sharing a room with the guy who ran the dances every night. It was also in another state, so I had no local contacts for conventions out here. I'd heard of MFF before, but it felt rather intimidating and I never really considered going. At that point I was largely a solo furry, I was familiar with the fandom but had never talked to another furry and never really considered trying to. It just wasn't a social thing for me at that point.
But in 2008 I started off by going to my second sci-fi con, and a local one that time. I'd had a great time again, and the friend I'd gone with suggested going to MFF that year with me, even though he wasn't a furry. I think he'd had a good time at the one con and wanted to try another one, and was a little curious about seeing what a furry con would be like. Maybe he also wanted to push me to go to it because he thought I'd enjoy it.
It was an intense experience. I arrived in the parking lot and saw my first fursuiter walking around outside and realized I wanted to howl out in celebration. I was there, I was really doing it!
The enthusiasm ended as soon as I walked into the hotel. As soon as I entered all I could think of was how it was filled with people I didn't know, and yet who all seemed to know each other. Yes, I'm not the most socially adept, it was an intimidating experience. I told myself that it would be better that night at the parties. Because that's the thing about sci-fi cons, at night it's all about the parties. There's typically a designated party floor where people hold public room parties, it doesn't matter if you know anybody there or not.
I was discouraged when I didn't see any sign posts with promotions for room parties, which sci-fi cons always have, but I told myself that things just must be different there. Maybe they just weren't up yet. But they never came up. I never found any public parties, and now I know that most furcons specifically prohibit the one standard element of a room party that I was looking for, the room door being propped open to advertise it as a public party.
That night I was pretty upset. I was almost angry at myself. As I was brushing my teeth, I was telling myself that it was a mistake to go, and that I was an idiot for thinking it would be any different there. Just because they were furries didn't mean I'd find it any easier to fit in.
You have to understand how intimidating the social scene was. I could see that there were a number of cliques. The fursuiters hung out together, the artists hung out, and so on. Well I'm kind of a writer, but there was no writer clique. I actually did find a photographer clique to hang out with at a later MFF, but that year I didn't see it. There seemed to be nowhere for me. I felt like a total outcast somewhere that I expected to instantly belong.
That was Friday. So Saturday found me doing the panel thing, going to the events I wanted to see and trying to make the most of what I thought was going to be a lost cause. I don't really remember what I did that day, all I remember is that night when I attended the variety show. Actually I think it started with Uncle Kage's story hour, but I'm not sure. And suddenly I started to feel it. I still didn't know any of those people, but I was sitting in a sea of them, surrounded by them on all sides. We were all laughing at the same jokes, and I started to feel the shared experience.
And then later that night there was the dance. That blew my mind. I'm an odd one, I've liked electronic dance music for a long time but have never really been a dancer. I'm too inhibited. But to be there and to see everything that was going on was amazing to me. The lights and the sounds and all the moving colorful furry things were intoxicating. The thing that I couldn't get over was how everyone was doing something different. All these different dancing styles all intermingling, and somehow it all worked together.
And then it happened. I'd heard about DJs supposedly being masters at controlling the flow of emotion of the dance, of mixing the songs together to maximize the intensity of it, but that all kind of sounded like overblown nonsense to me. That is until the DJ playing at the time did this transition to a bit of rather obscure Jpop, and somehow I had the most intense experience of the convention. I wasn't even dancing, but just being there and hearing and seeing it all was enough. This wave of feeling washed over me, it's hard to explain but it basically was the feeling that I was there, I was experiencing it, I was living! Just one of those magic moments that you can't really understand, all you can do is feel it.
Eventually I had to call an end to the night. I had panels to do the next day and reluctantly left the dance. And that was when the disembodied robo llama head spoke to me. Umm.. yes. I can't remember what name he went by, but there was one super elaborate costume that was of a kind of cyborg llama, at least I think it was a llama. And apparently the head had a camera in it, and the owner had set it on the table by the dance doors. I walked up to it, and it called me by name and invited me to have some of the candy that was scattered about the table. "Come take some candy from a stranger" was how he worded it. So on that surreal note I headed back to my room.
The friend that I'd gone with was already in his bed, and I didn't want to wake him up. But somehow I ended up talking to him, almost shouting when my exuberance started spilling out. I couldn't help it, I was just so jazzed about how I felt. It was like a yoyo of emotion, after feeling so dejected the first day I had come all the way around to elation, and I just had to talk about it. I think he was laughing at me, and that was okay. I was ridiculous, I knew it even then. I didn't care. When you get a moment like that you don't question it, you just go along for the ride.
I looked for a copy of that DJ's set for months, but I never even knew who he was. Months later I finally found it, I was on my laptop in my bed and just winding down before I went to sleep. Then I hit that transition and it all came back to me, and I got so excited that I couldn't sleep for hours. He now goes by Audiodile, and I still watch his web site for any new sets.
Sunday was the usual bittersweet ending. I was walking around thinking how nothing really had changed, it's not like I'd suddenly fallen in with a group of people that I could easily socialize with, but at the same time I felt that sense of belonging. I'd seen a lot of amazing things, and I got my picture taken with this one fursuiter that I was kind of fond of.
And then on the drive back, I experienced PCD. Post Con Depression. Holy crap that was vicious. All I could think of was that the world looked so cold and grey. After being surrounded by brightly colored furry things I was suddenly surrounded by the bleak midwestern winter. I don't know how it hits anyone else, but I couldn't get over this feeling that life would never be okay again.
But I learned that a good night's sleep can do wonders. I woke up feeling much better, but still with the good memories of what I'd just been through.
I've built on that experience. I've been every year since then, and after I learned of a local furry group in my area from a stranger I roomed with in 2009 (who turned out to live about 5 minutes from me) I started going to their monthly bowling meets.
The MFF experience for me now is so different. For the past couple years it's been a case of walking around and having all these people call out to me. I know I always react weird, it's just that I have a really difficult time figuring out who they are. I have difficulty recognizing faces, and when I'm surrounded by so many strange faces it just kind of overloads me and I don't see the familiar ones. So if I go strangely blank when you greet me just understand, it totally is me, not you. I offended someone before who thought that my lack of response indicated that I didn't want to talk to him, and I feel terrible for that. It's just that it takes me a while to shift gears and get into the chit chat mode.
But believe me, it matters to me. It makes me feel like I belong. Okay, so I still don't know most of the people there. That's over a thousand people, of course I don't know them. But I'm amazed at how many people I do know, and who know me. I know a bunch from the local meets, I know a snow leopard fursuiter that I roomed with in 2009, and then there's this one girl who apparently I talked to initially in 2011. I don't remember at all, she says I was very drunk, and that part at least rings true. And yet she seems happy to see me every year, so it can't have gone that badly.
All you guys rock. You make MFF amazing for me every year. I should not be comfortable at an event this large, I should be running away screaming from it. Instead I feel like it's my event, I feel that confidence that comes from believing that you belong.
I invite anyone reading this to share a convention story of their own in the comments. I admit to being curious what these things are like for other people.
