VANCOUVER, B.C. — Before we see where the woman with a white cane is going, Justine Wack hears where she’s headed, by listening to her clicking. “I make a clicking sound with my tongue and the sound bounces back at me,” Justine says. “And I can figure out what I’m hearing based on those echoes.” Justine is blind and echo location allows her to detect if she’s approaching a car, building or tree. While this skill lets Justine hear what’s generally surrounding her, now that she also wears wireless earbuds and AI glasses, she can also tell what specifically is. “What do you see over this direction,” Justine asks, before the camera in her glasses responds back through the speaker in her ear with the correct answer. “It’s a large mural that appears to have ocean waves on it.” Although Justine doesn’t really know what waves look like because she’s been blind since birth, she does absolutely know her musical notes because she was born with perfect pitch. “We figured that out because two-year-old me had a Simon Cowell-esque tantrum,” Justine laughs about her first music class. “Because none of the other two-year-olds were singing in the correct key!” Justine wrote her first song on guitar at seven, after teaching herself how to play piano, and now can composes beats and record vocals using a music studio that fits in her backpack, to produce music professionally. “I decided from a young age that I was going to build my own business,” Justine says. “So, nobody could tell me that I couldn’t do the jobs that I knew I could do.” So now — thanks to a strong work ethic, accessible technology, and innate talent — Justine writes and performs empowering pop music under the name Justine On Green. “My goal is to make a positive impact on the world,” Justine says. Which is why, Justine also runs a management company to champion overlooked artists to realize their goals too. “You got to make a life for yourself no matter what’s going on,” Justine says. “Because you only got one life to live.” So, no matter what adversity your facing, Justine says, never lose sight of realizing your dreams.
