John Minor Carothers III Memorial

I have put off doing this for a while. I've been afraid of letting my emotions get to me. I've been afraid of forgetting some things. I've just been afraid.

I have never done a tribute post or anything. Normally I post about useless crap that no one even cares about, but this one is definitely worthy of a post.

One month ago today, our little community lost a truly amazing person. I've heard many, many rumors about his death, but I refuse to pay attention to them, even if some of them are true. I will not think of the John right before his death, but I will think of the John who I knew and loved. The real John. The John who put everything in the world before himself. THAT is the only John I will think of, not some rumor.

I could have come up with a million great names for this post, but it's pretty much gonna be talking about so many things, but only one thing...at the same time! *Insert your mind being blown* So I just simply put what the whole post is based on, John Minor Carothers III.

Now before I begin, there are a few things you need to know about John:

1. He was a HUGE germophobe.
2. He was one of the smartest people I know...especially when it came to history.
3. He was just a huge goof-ball.
4. He had the greatest smile I've ever seen. Like seriously, it was beautiful.
5. He loved EVERYONE. He would take the clothes off his back for someone...even if they didn't need them! 
6. John was the chunkiest kid...keep that in mind while you're reading this.

 In elementary school, I didn't know John very well until 4th grade. He quickly became my friend, like he did with everyone else he met. He was hilarious. He had his own signature "face" that could make ANYONE laugh, even if someone was having the worst day ever. Its extremely hard to describe, but I'm gonna do the best I can. He would take his thumb and index finger and lift up the skin above his eyes and make the top part of his cheeks go down, so his eyes look like a Charlie Brown character when they're surprised. Then he would make like the Jenna Marbles face (if you don't know who she is, then go live in a ditch; if you know who she is but haven't seen the video, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wRXa971Xw0 ) and do some kind of ripple thing with his tongue. So he looked like a chubby, demented, mentally ill kid. This was one of the most glorious things ever. I can NEVER forget the first time I saw this face. It's still fourth grade. I'm in like the very back of the row. John is in the front. And all of a sudden, I see him leaned down and turned completely around and I just lose it during class! That has ALWAYS been the "John face".

Middle school. Gross. John had ended up being home-schooled 7th grade, so I haven't seen him in a while. Then one night at a football game, I was making my laps around the whole stadium (don't ask why, I was weird.) and I had passed an overweight girl that was smiling at me. I just kept going, but then my spidey-senses started tingling, and I realized what smile that was. So I turned around and looked at the girl's face...it wasn't a girl...it was JOHN! He had grown his hair out SO long! I wish I remembered about the John face at that moment, because I would have DEFINITELY made him do it in John-girl form. But anyways, I had asked him, "John! What in the world did you do to your hair?!" And John, who always made a huge deal about things he thought were so cool, rambled on and on about "Oh! It's this really cool organization where you grow it out to this certain length and cut it and they make wigs out of it for cancer patients......." and the whole time I'm thinking "And your mom is letting you do this?!?!" So he cared so much for other people that he would sacrifice his look, just to make a cancer patient happier.

8th grade. This is where most of it starts. We had Coach Collier's class together. He HATED me! Ya know why? Because John talked to me EVERYDAY in his class, and he got me in trouble EVERYDAY! But, we laughed about it every time. One day, John walked in late, and accidentally slammed the door, so Coach Collier and his sassy self said, "Why don't you turn around and try that again?" and this ticked John off. He screamed "I DIDN'T MEAN TO! GOOOOAAASSSSHHHHH!" Not only was it hysterical that screamed at Coach Collier (which I've always wanted to do) but he messed up when he tried to say the word "gosh" and we laughed about it for literally years! We also made fun of this extremely corny acne commercial (you may remember it, it was the one with the teen sitting in the acne isle of the grocery store, and the worker walks by and says, "Kid! Get a life!" and he replies with, "I'M TRYYYINNNGGGG!") and I couldn't go a whole day without hearing the "I'M TRYYYYINNNGGGG!" line! 8th grade was also when John became involved with the wrong group of people. They would talk about doing stuff on weekends in PE. One day, I was just being nosey and asked John what they were talking about. He refused to tell me, until he finally felt guilty and did tell me. He did not want me to know at all; not because he was ashamed, but he wanted to make sure an innocent person did not become involved with bad ways, even if he already did. He put other people's actions before himself.

Freshman year. We were still good friends. This time I was getting John in trouble in Mrs. Powell's class! And I always looked at him and said, "Payback." Everything was going great...until I found out he liked my cousin. I disapproved because I still thought he was bad, but I was informed later that he wasn't anymore. So it was all cool. I would, though, act like it wasn't, just to mess with her. We'd be over at her house like EVERY single weekend. It was crazy. We'd be over there during graduation exam week, and he'd bring his best friend and his cousin, and they were WILD. 'Nuff said. I stayed inside because they horseplayed too much! I am 100% sure that he has ALWAYS been in love with her. ALWAYS. Like, I think he was in love with her the day he died. He may have liked other people, and may have been in love with other people to, but he was still in love with her. He may not have always been, but I know for a fact that, if he wasn't always in love with her, he still loved her as a sister SO much. And the same way with her. We also always"insulted" each other everyday. Not a day went buy that he didn't hear me say "Shutup John!" or "You're so stupid John!" OR even "John, you're such a stupid skank!" or something of the sort. And he would reply "Goodman! You're such a dirty hoe!"

I don't have a lot to say about Sophomore year because we didn't have a single class together. But I do have a hilarious story. So it's the very first day, and I'm caught up seeing everyone, then I see John. Remember how I saw he was always the chunkiest thing? Yeah. Not anymore. He lost ALL OF IT! And he was TALL! I looked at him and said "What the crap happened to you?!" And he said, "Oh, I went on a diet." like it was nothing. And I was just like "Really John? I honestly could not tell." He was such a blonde. The only other thing I can really remember is him being in our "Scrooge's Christmas" play and helping A LOT with our set. He would do anything for our drama club. We realized the other day that he was one of the VERY few people that we could rely on to be there whenever and to do his job right. Not only that, but he wouldn't complain or ask questions.

This year. This is definitely gonna be the longest. For two reasons; we spent A LOT of time with each other, and because I don't have the best memory, but I can remember a lot of details this year.
Around the end of 10th grade year, I found out that V (our band director) wanted actors in the halftime show. Of course, I was ALL over that. There were five guys and three girls. John had started out as the feature, dancing with his best friend, until he put too much emotion into it and broke his hand. (To give you a brief description of the show so you know what was going on, it was 40s themed. WW2. Three guys were dancing with their women in the first song. At then end, they go off to basic training, then there's a parade march as we go to war, then there's a war scene with a drum break, then we all die in the war except for the feature, he comes back and is searching for his woman friend. Our band is beast.). It was pretty finny. But he was ALWAYS late. ALWAYS. On the first game, the dancers had to be at the band room to get ready at 4:30; the band had to be there dressed at 5:50. It's 6:00 and everyone is freaking out and calling around trying to find him. At 6:45 when the band is lined up to march out for pre-game, he comes rolling. He had been asleep. And you could tell. Me, our captain, and his partner were PISSED! He heard it from us. Our captain and I were ALWAYS yelling at him. In band, you had to be STRICT. And it was so funny that he was the only one. And he could not march worth a crap. We practiced that COUNTLESS times, and he got it on like the first competition day. He was ALWAYS goofing around at practice, which made it fun. One day, we were on the way to a football game, and he had suddenly gotten a text from someone. It was some girl who said she met him at a competition...but he didn't meet anyone there. So we think its some creepy girl that hung out with our band because her band was lame. And by the texts, she makes us think that she wants the D, so me and another one of the dancers were telling him what to say, trying to get it out of this girl, but it turns out, it was just my cousin's friend messing with him. Outside of band, I had the first four classes with him. He wasn't really himself in first through third because I guess he still had to wake up, but once we hit fourth, the real John and his smile came out. He was always loud and joking around. One day him and this one kid were messing around, and John picked him up and dropped him. The substitute asked "What are you doing?!" He said, "....a science experiment." Like it was obvious or something.

I'm watching The Amazing Spider-Man (which is AMAZING!). I get a text saying from one of my close friends saying, "John from the dancers is missing." I freak out. I get on facebook for information, and I see about 3 or 4 posts. Then I refresh the page. It's everywhere. I'm shocked. I shared the pictures and statuses and everything and realized that there wasn't anything for me to do. I figure they'll find him in a few days and everything will be over like most cases around here.

November 11, 2012. I get home from church. I get a phone call at 1:45 saying that John had committed suicide. I was shocked at first that I really didn't know what to say. At about 4:00 that afternoon, it hit me.

We return to school that Tuesday (it was Veteran's Day Monday). I'm wearing my plaid along with everyone else because he wore it all the time. I get there at 7:00 for a memorial service in the auditorium. I walk in, and I have never EVER heard a room filled with so many people so quiet. The first step I took into it, I lost it. After his dad spoke and we prayed, they wanted us to take a picture. That was the dumbest thing ever. I doubt there was a smiling face in that picture. That was the worse day ever. First period, no one said a word. Second period, we figure out talking about memories helped A LOT. Third period, everyone gets pissed because we found out someone with no respect had posted something very rude on Twitter. Fourth period, fourth period was bad. The family asked the teacher if we would write our memories down. No, I didn't write this much, but I did mention what I wrote in this. The day was a little better after that.

That Wednesday was the visitation. I saw his face for the first time since Friday. It was weird. He wasn't smiling. He was peaceful, but he wasn't smiling.

Thursday was the funeral. It was a good funeral service, if there is such a thing.

November 20th was his birthday. We had a little birthday party thing at the school. We wrote him note and stuck them in balloons. It was great sharing memories with him. Afterwards, a group went to visit his grave. We sang "Happy Birthday" to him. I'm glad we did it.

Now. We miss him. SO much. The school is dull without that shining smile. We're better, but we still miss him.

I hope that for those who knew John, they enjoyed this a lot. For those who didn't know him, I hope you got a good idea of who I was blessed to grow up with.

A pessimist (John actually taught me that word...fun fact!) told me that we don't have the authority to say someone is in Heaven. So I think he believes that John may be in Hell because John committed suicide. Yes, suicide may be a sin, but it is NOT unforgivable. There is only ONE that is (which is blasphemy) and I know John didn't do that. I understood where the guy was coming from, and I know that we don't have the authority to say someone's in Heaven, but I wish he didn't say that while I was still emotionally unstable. I believe that John is in Heaven with all my heart, and I know he is up there smiling that smile more than ever!

Here are some pictures of John that are my favorite:

This was John Freshman year...

This was John in September.

 

The girl is one of my best friends and was my dancing partner, that was our "baby" in the show. I always called John and the other guy the other two fathers to my baby, because we always argued who the real father was. (It's me ;D)

This picture is my favorite. This was John's beautiful smile.

This was taken at the capitol on a field trip last year. We were all just sitting up there and someone told us to take a picture.

These are the dancers in the show that I have made many memories with. I love all of them very much and I would do anything for them. I'm so glad that I got to have this experience, and I'm glad I got to spend it with John.

Goodbye everyone.

Goodbye John. R.I.P.