Within seconds, it appeared on tons of screens as the Facebook pages loaded and Instagram and Twitter apps were opened. There it was – so small, yet so big – “World Peace for Justin.”
Justin Carr died on Friday February 22. I wasn’t at the funeral that early Saturday morning March 2, but I saw how the powerful words Justin Carr’s father uttered there spread like a wildfire. #JC4WP materialized in a snap, and was suddenly felt and seen and heard everywhere.
At first, I felt a little uneasy about the message. I thought that somehow this broad, ever-encompassing idea could swallow up Justin and take away from all of his minute, embellishing details and quirks. I was scared that people wouldn’t remember Justin for all of his unique and subtle nuisances, but would say, “oh yeah, that’s the world peace guy.” I thought that the popular, new slogan might mask everything that Justin was.
But when I started to think more about it, and watch people bustle about and move on with their fast-paced daily lives, I realized that such a ubiquitous and grand topic was really the only thing that could sum up Justin in his whole. He was big and broad and his presence was felt, and that’s how I believe world peace should start. It may seem like an unreachable goal, but peace can be felt and spread in so many different ways.
Peace can be as simple as reaching out to someone you’ve been at odds with, or maybe it’s holding onto a fleeting moment of calm and steady in a sea of chaos. It could even be bringing a sound intensity to everything you try, just as Justin did. I think as we all start to flirt and mingle with our own ideas of world peace, that’s when it can really build and unite into something beautiful; and together, who knows? Maybe we really can achieve Justin’s dream of world peace.