I don't think Yuoo talked about suicide that much, Salem; granted, he was open about his mental issues but to me it wasn't annoying. For some people, talking is a way of dealing with things, and it seemed to be Yuoo's.
Anyway, Yuoo...what a cool guy. Even from the first time I saw his avatar of a fennec in a friar's robe and gold cross way back in 2005, I knew he was someone special. Then in the "This is what I look like" thread he posted a photo of himself in a robe with a cross and a Firefox plushie on his shoulder. That was just the neatest thing! I often addressed him as "Brother Yuoo" when he came on AIM, and his user title on FFC eventually became Brother Fennec.
His diary (which if you didn't know was a furry version of his real life one) was always fun to read. I loved the word that represented Tallahassee, Florida, where he used to live: Loblolly. It sounded so quaint, like it could have come from a children's book. That's another thing I liked about Yuoo; his sense of humor had a certain subtle cuteness to it. I finally asked him what it meant during what turned out to be our last conversation, on January 6th, almost at the end of his month-long forum fast. Turns out that the Loblolly is a type of pine found in the Florida panhandle area. Who knew? ^^; It's great that Yuoo could find such a charming word to represent his fursona's town. Not just a random word that sounded cool but that also reflected his real life.
Last summer Yuoo created a furry Olympics RP. I loved this line the most: "Watch him spike the ball...with his ears!" Another RP he started was called Feral Forest, in which everyone was a feral animal that couldn't talk, as opposed to an anthro. That was a nice, fun little change. Yuoo's creativity was definitely something else I admired about him. I loved his simple, toony drawing style and his skills in 3D modeling. One time he created Oblivion avatars for Aurrin, Osric and me. There was also Project Gecko, an animation and modeling project Yuoo did of my fursona. The culmination was Gecko kneeling down and praying in front of a cross; he even used it for a school project. His next project was going to be an animation of Gecko playing a synth to a piece of music I was to choose. So I sent him the link to an NES piece I composed, "Morrison's Folly".
Yuoo was so calm in spirit and slow to anger. Despite all the stuff he went through in his life he didn't seem to project any intense anger or rage--at least not online--just frustration. I think he knew that he wanted to get better but just didn't know if it would come soon enough.
It was great to see him when he came back to FFC in, 2007 I believe, after a really long time. One day I thought, "Hey, whatever happened to Yuoofox? I haven't seen him around the forum in a long time!" And some time after that, he returned, detailing everything that had happened to him. He had walked away from the faith for a while and gone heavily face-first into yiff. Even had to be medically discharged from college because some of his mental stuff had gotten unbearably worse. But once he came back after so long it really looked like he was eager to continue on the right path. And I was rooting for Yuoo, praying for him. Then when he signed on last week I again felt that he was going to be OK.
Brother Jesse Birch was an inspiration and a friend. I will miss him dearly. May God have mercy on his soul and may He give peace to his family. Amen.
