*Travis Johnston is a fictional character we came up on the West Coast Trail. We pictured him as a worker at our company's Shipping and Receiving department and he died on the trail. Although it is a eulogy, it was meant to amuse people. That's why you may find inside jokes hidden everywhere.*
Oh behalf of his friends and colleagues, I would like to share with you how we feel about Travis. In addition to his unbridled enthusiasm of adventure and his irrepressible spirit, there are many more things that we should know about this young man.
Love is not an easy feeling to put into words, nor is loyalty, or joy. But he was all of these. He loved life completely and he lived it intensely. He used to mention to me that he had no regrets because he lived life to its full. For that, I hold my deepest gratitude. Inspired by these simple words, people like me act to improve the life of ours as well as of others. He received enlightenment from God. Much more than that, he past it on to all of us. He gave us strength in time of trouble, wisdom in time of uncertainty, courage in time of difficulty and sharing in time of joy.
A few years back, Travis and I rode mountain bike in the in Kananaskis country. We finished the 65km ride in just about two hours. I sighed: “Time and tide wait for no man. By the time we start to realize something, it is often too late.” And he continued: “It is never too late; never too late to right the wrong, to heal the suffering or to stop the wars. ”;I engraved these words onto a rock I found in Lillian Lake where we camped and put it on my desk to remind me the fierce urgency to achieve the most, serve my moral obligations, and improve the life of others.
I often complained about my job. Then Travis said to me “If you cannot do what you love, then love what you do.” These words summarize the shaping impulse of his work attitude. Working as a team lead at Shipping and Receiving department, Travis was always passionate about mails and cardboard boxes. It was no surprise to see him 9 o’clock at night categorizing mails and correcting spelling mistakes on envelops. He even constantly volunteered as a speed warden holding radar gun in our parking garage. He did more than loved his job. He also used new ideas and technology to achieve the maximal efficiency. He even applied the Dewey Decimal system to categorizing mails. He never missed any annual Worldwide Shipper & Receiver Convention. For his contribution, he was awarded a total of 20 Canadian Mail Man of the Year awards and constantly invited as a keynote speaker at the annual Worldwide Shipper & Receiver Convention. Almost a score year since the beginning of his career of shipping and receiving, we now all benefit from his ingenuity in different industries and in different aspects of our daily life.
This perfectly sums up to his view of the world. In this conundrum of life and history,most of us do not believe one man or one woman can stand against the enormous array of world’s ills. Yet, many of the world’s great movement, thoughts of actions all have flowed from the work of a single person. A young Jewish person who died for the sins of mankind; a young general who extended an empire from Mongolia to the border of the earth; a clergy who started the civil rights movement, a young Italian who discovered the new world; and the 32-year-old shipping and receiving worker who changed the world of mails and boxes. These men moved the world, so can we all. This was what Travis lived for and this is what he leaves to us.
Although Travis had a PhD in Logistics, he loved learning; His favorite reading was “This and That” from our company’s bi-weekly journal. He never missed one issue even at the last moment of his life and he studied every word of it. He often envisioned himself traveling with Nigel and Dianna(owners of our fictional company) around the world, receiving greeting with them at the White House, and watching our stock broke the $17 record high on Nasdaq with them. At the worst moment of his illness, Nigel talked about their new private jet and new multi-billion-dollar-house in "This and That". Unfortunately, it was too late for Travis to continue his envision. But it is never too late for us. We will carry on this tradition. We will enjoy “This and That” as he did and we will imagine ourselves in those occasions as he did. His envision will continue to inspire us.
In our current society, moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery and intelligence. Yet, it is one essential, vital quality for those who seek to change the world. Travis demonstrated his moral courage by braving the disapproval of his fellows, the censure of his colleagues and the wrath of the society. Travis urged us to make a change in this era of danger and uncertainty. He already moved one step. But it’s a long road ahead and the rest is on all of us. Change, yes we can. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or strikes out against injustice, or acts to improve the life of others, he sends forward a ripple of hope. Travis sent us a wave of hope and he showed us the beacon. The rest is on us. One day when the ripples build a current, it can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. And that is precisely the treasure that Travis leaves to us: hope; hope in the face of difficulty; hope in the face of uncertainty; the audacity of hope.
On the last day of Travis’ life, he used up all his strength to tell the rest of WCT survivors that he didn’t want to be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life.
We will simply remember him as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw injustice and tried to correct it.
In the end, I would like quote his favorite words from George Bernard Shaw: “Some men see things as they are and say why, I dream things that never were and say why not”.
CREDIT (some of the words are quotes from following people):
Robert Kennedy
Martin Luther King Jr
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