Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about Justin “JewWario” Carmical. I’ve been watching his videos and reading his blog. I am really sad I will never get a chance to know him. I didn’t even discover him until after his death, when his passing was being discussed on the Completely Unnecessary podcast. It’s strange to me how deeply I feel this loss. Especially since I was not his personal friend. But in the short amount of time I have been watching his videos, I feel like he was my friend. I also feel like we are very similar in many ways. We both loved magic, video games... we even had birthdays very close together.. (For some reason, April babies seem to have a certain "look to them"
 
Part of the reason it hit me very hard, is that I went through a similar experience seven and half years ago, when my best friend commited suicide. The other people who knew my friend seemed to be able to move on with their lives, but for so many years I just couldn’t get it out of my system.

It was somewhat reassuring to see Justin’s friends expressing many of the things I had thought and felt. I could really relate to Joshua and Kaylyn Saucedo’s “Farewell Famikamen Rider” film (I wish I could have attended the MAGfest screening). I knew exactly what was driving them, because I had done something similar when I decided to continue working on a graphic novel that I had started when my friend was still alive. ( https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B79L9YOsC2OvMTE0Z0dVNDJQRTQ... )

The “You’re not stupid” soundbite may have gone viral, (and deservedly so!), but if you back it up a little bit more, Justin gives some very good insight into what his experiences with depression were like for him. It is hard for us looking from the outside to understand how someone who was so loved and loving could do this, but I think this helps to explain things somewhat.
http://youtu.be/iaJT3Y04sKk?t=24m1s
(bonus: he sings a Mr. Rogers tune at the end)
Here is the comic that Justin was referencing in that stream:
http://www.akimbocomics.com/comic/2010-10-04-Eat_Shit_And_Di...

Even with all that, it’s still hard to reconcile that with the person who had recorded this the night before:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRKyCnC6nlw 

He wrote this after seeing Penn Jillette's show in January 2007 (perhaps an idea that Penn suggested they try as an exercise?

Hi my name is Justin Spencer Carmical, and I just died.

I have made many mistakes in my life, and was often ignorant of many friends that I had. I hated myself as well as other people. I never had an original thought in my life, and never did everything I should have. I cursed like a sailor, drank too much, and kept grudges for far too long.

But I never loved any woman more than my wife Jennifer, and I spent the last part of my life enjoying our time together. While I was alive she spent more time making me happy than she should have and, for that, she is a saint.

Mourn me, but not for too long... you have your own lives to enjoy.

"I can't be sure where I'm headed after death,
To Heaven, Hell, or beyond to that Great Vast.
But if I can I would like to meet my Maker,
There's one or two things I'd sure like to ask"


Super Mario Routine (For Justin)
(mario monogues)
Shrinker by Andrew Mayne
Growing / shrinking (touch a turtle and shrink down w/ SFX)
Mushroom appear
Coins disappearing/ appearing (misers dream)
Fire/ flower
Color changing hat (Mario to Luigi/ to Wario)
Appearing mushing
Plumber/pipes


Justin’s Jedi act
I am too a Jedi
Change Bag (color changing silks)
Jedi drawing mentalism
Royal Revision
Color changing water (clear to red) (in a Champaign glass)
Red and blue tubes (transpose?)
Appearing pole (light saber)
Kabuki streamers (jedi lightening)