~Hollow Soul~

My name is Gelatin. I'm a 28-year-old furry nerd who is enrolled in a computer programming course. I've interacted with computers since I was around 5 years old; these machines have always fascinated me with their capabilities. Originally I used them for browsing forums, IRC channels, and playing Flash & Shockwave games. In elementary school I have fond memories of using a program to learn how to type on a keyboard, using Kid Pix to make silly art, and teaching my peers how to use proxies to bypass the school's network restrictions to access websites we probably shouldn't have been on at such a young age. (Whoops)

In my adolescent years I always had a bit of an unhealthy obsession with an anthropomorphic video game mascot, Sonic the Hedgehog. Playing the PC port of Sonic 3 at a cousin's house It became a core memory; the sprites engraved themselves into my retinas. I was moved by the music, primarily because I was unaware of the fact that the PC port sported shitty MIDI versions due to copyright reasons, however. I was a kid and didn't know any better. This obsession with Sonic blossomed over the years, getting an original Xbox on Christmas Day in the early 2000s and a copy of Sonic Heroes. My first true experience of a 3D Sonic game, and what an experience it was! (Funny in retrospect with the removal of rose-tinted glasses, this game is a slippery nightmare.) Playing the 4 different teams facing different challenges and the final boss and hearing Mystic Mansion and Hang Castle for the first time changed the trajectory of my questionable little life forever.

Sometime in high school My music taste transitioned from trance and nightcore to more intricate EDM subgenres, most likely due to the catastrophic rise of EDM in the early 2010s. Somehow during my sleuthing I came across furry rave music, a mostly niche blend of mashcore, breakbeat, jungle, and speedcore, among other things. I was blown away at some of these sounds, the most credible outlet being Halley Labs. (F.K.A. Lapfox) Despite mixed reactions from my peers when I'd present them with such discoveries, I always rejected the label of being a "furry" with a weak rebuttal of "I'm not a furry, I'm just a Sonic fan!" (right...)

Eventually, I accepted that I am, in fact, a furry—and there's nothing wrong with that. This revelation didn't come to me until I was in my late 20s, drunk and raving with a bunch of full suiters at Furnal Equinox in Toronto, Ontario. I didn't know it was possible to feel so good and free, to let your freak flag fly. Though I had come out as bi/omnisexual, I hadn't experienced something as liberating as a furry rave. On the internet and in real life, you can be whatever you want to be. I dropped out of school at 20 and ended up chasing the dragon through various substances. In retrospect, I think it was a coping mechanism—I felt repressed for most of my life and wasn't comfortable opening up about my sexuality or gender expression until I was 24.

Recently, going back to school at 27, many of my classmates are much younger than me. Several being fresh out of high school. They've jokingly yet sternly given me the title of “UNC” (uncle), which is fair, unfortunately. Despite the age gap, I still feel connected through my creative outlets—my edgy inner persona, my fursona Syphon the Hellbat, my music production, and my website Hollow Soul.