Well, What Do You Know? Milton Is For Something

By Al Levine

For AccessMilton.com

Flip through the press clippings about Milton's first year and it's easy to get the impression of a city that's against everything.

It's against new schools and water towers near its tony subdivisions.  It's against buildings taller than a Chihuahua.  It's against political signs if they are bigger than a business card.  It's against billboards and who can blame the citizens for that?

My goodness, Milton even seemed to be against the flag. A fast-food franchise ticketed for a tool-tall flagpole flying Old Glory eventually won an appeal.

Made a casual observer ponder: Was that a horse on the city logo or a stubborn jackass? And shouldn't there be a diagonal line in the O in Milton, meaning We Forbid Just About Everything?

Well, those perceptions were all changed a couple months ago by an extraordinary event. Milton, it turns out, has a big heart and proved it can stand up for something.

Milton's Ian Murphy [15] goes aireborne to disrupt a pass by Westminster goalie Tommy Noonan [27] in the Legacy Lacrosse Cup at Milton High School. Westminster beat the Eagles 9-7.  Al Levine photo

Milton wrapped its arms around The Legacy Lacrosse Cup and the Jackson family. Surely, attendance at the first Legacy Cup could have been bigger, but one of the two playing dates was impacted by a serious thunderstorm. And though Milton High's girls team has won the last three state championships, lacrosse is largely an alien sport in the land of football. It's a strange game. Kids run up and down the field carrying a little yellow ball in a net hanging at the end of a pole, inevitably flinging it towards what looks like a soccer goal left too long in the dryer. The Legacy Cup is one family's mission to perpetuate the memory of their son, who died in a single-car accident little more than a year ago, and pass along his legacy of planning out a life with purpose.

The Legacy Cup matched nine top teams from Georgia, Tennessee and North and South Carolina. They were involved not to win the Cup – a trophy does not exist – but to enjoy the competition and learn something about life.

Parker Jackson played for Milton through his sophomore year, and then he was gone. But he made a powerful impression in his 16 years.

The players at Milton High still wear his initials on armbands. Former classmates now in college are wearing his number, 22, including Jerome Arnold at Yale. "I'd already had that number," Arnold said on the phone from Yale, "and after he passed away it kind of became something more than just a number to me. I was honored to wear it."

Bo Jackson challenged the participants in the first Legacy Lacrosse Cup to consider mapping out a life plan. Al Levine photo

The Milton girls team dedicated its 2007 season to Parker Jackson. The day of the state championship game, most of the team showed up at Parker's Place, held hands and prayed. After coming from behind to beat Northview for the state championship, they left the game ball, signed by the players, at his grave. His dad, Bo Jackson, calls the plot where his son is buried in a cemetery on Freemanville Road "Parker's Place," and it has become something special. There's a journal tucked in a mailbox under a bench nearby where visitors record their thoughts. Some Milton neighbors planted a dogwood there. By all accounts, Parker Jackson was a kid who inspired this kind of behavior. He was popular, good-looking and outgoing. He taught Sunday school at his church to fourth-graders.

At a very young age, he put together a timeline of his life. He had it all mapped out, down to starting his first job on June 25, 2012, getting married in April 2015 and having his first child in December of 2015. He thought he'd live to be 100.

 His death stunned North Fulton.

When the family pastor, Andy Stanley, arrived at the Jackson home after the funeral, Ben, Parker's younger brother asked him how God could let Parker die. Stanley didn't have the answer but he replied, "this is what I do know, that God won't waste any time showing up and turning this tragedy into triumph for God's own good."

Eighteen months later, Bo Jackson can say with conviction "we have seen that."

Such as the Jewish woman who changed her faith walk and went on a mission to Africa after meeting the Jackson family.

And Parker's friends who organized a celebration of his life last November and made a video at school in which the students described him in one word. You heard "awesome" and "inspiring" a lot.

Jackson said his family got through that terrible first year with the love of Miltonians.

"The first year, people would just show up, they might bring food," Bo said. "They would leave voicemails saying I am thinking of you, I'm thinking of your family, I'm thinking of your pain, your loss.

"Most people don't think about anybody else except themselves. It's human nature. And we saw firsthand people just constantly caring. I mean, I must have had a million hugs from women and men, and still get 'em. We still get hugs and we give hugs all the time because we feel very blessed that this community lifted us up, carried us through this valley of death. It's only because of that that we're able to be productive."

Part of that productivity was developing the Legacy Lacrosse Cup, which included some spirited games and a dinner for all the participants.

After the players were fed, they digested a few inspiring talks. The night ended with Bo Jackson challenging them to live a legacy, handing out cards to help them chart a meaningful life the way Parker had done.

"From what I know and what I've been told, the grieving never ends, it just changes in many ways," Bo said.  "Little things can cause you to tear up. It could be something somebody said that's thoughtful. Or going to a lacrosse game and looking out there and realizing Parker's supposed to be out there playing. This isn't supposed to happen. Your children aren't supposed to die before you do. It doesn't go away. But I do think it could be crippling if you hang on to your grief as an anchor that you drag with you forever."

The Jacksons are trying to look at life as a glass half full, not half empty. There is so much meaning to what they do, including the inscription on Parker's tombstone. It's an old family saying he used to hear as he would rush from the dinner table to hang out with friends.

It reads: "Had a blast. Wish I could have stayed longer."