Naming a Legacy: The Story Behind J. Parker

Life has a way of turning in a single moment. One minute you think you understand your world—your future, your path—and the next you’re standing in the middle of something you never saw coming, wondering how on earth you’re supposed to keep breathing.

I learned that lesson at 27 years old, sitting on the front steps of a hospital, crying out with a sound I didn’t even know could come from me. My son, J. Parker, had just been born at 27 weeks and 4 days—one pound, eleven ounces. He was so small, so fragile, hooked up to more tubes and wires than you ever want to see on a child. They told us he had an 80% chance of survival, and I clung to that number like it was oxygen.

He lived for one day.

When the doctor called to tell us he had died, I physically stopped breathing. I fell into Kelly—my wife at the time and my best friend since we were twelve—and the two of us just wailed. There’s no elegant way to talk about that kind of moment. Time stops. The ground drops out from under you. The world goes quiet in a way you never forget. Kelly passed away thirteen years ago, but the strength we shared in that moment is something I will carry for the rest of my life.

Grief doesn’t leave you the way people say it will. It changes shape, sure. It softens at the edges. But it stays with you. I think about him every single day. And even after years of therapy, I still come apart when I visit his grave. You don’t “get over” your child. You learn how to carry them differently.

But here’s the part I want people to understand:
as painful as those moments were, they didn’t end my story.

They rerouted it.

They forced me to learn things about strength, about faith, about what really matters. I learned that Jesus was the only one I could lean on when everything else around me gave way. And over time, I began to see what Isaiah 61:3 really means:

“He gives beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.”

I didn’t just read that verse. I lived it.
And eventually, I saw how something good—something meaningful—could grow from the ashes I thought would bury me.

Years later, long after the ache found its place inside me, Johnny and I were sitting on the sofa in our condo in Fort Lauderdale, tossing around names for a business we weren’t even sure would work. We had our coffee, we had a notebook, and we had absolutely no idea what to call this thing we were dreaming up.

Then it just… came out.
Not with fanfare, not with tears, not with any dramatic pause.
Just a simple, almost casual thought that felt like it had been waiting for years:

“What about… J. Parker?”

And the second those words left my mouth, everything in the room shifted.
It was warm. Clear. Easing.
Like something inside me clicked into place.

Johnny didn’t hesitate. He just said, “Yes.”
And in that moment, I loved him even more.

That was the first time in my life that the pain didn’t feel heavy.
It felt purposeful.

Using Parker’s name wasn’t about branding or sentiment.
It was about honoring him.
About choosing to create something good from something that nearly crushed me.

Today, when I see his name printed on our boxes, bags, and banners, it doesn’t hurt—it fills me with real joy. The kind of joy that sits deep in your chest and reminds you:
I survived that.
I grew from that.
Something beautiful came out of something unthinkably hard.

And that’s really the heart of our company.

We run this business with integrity because his name is on it.
We show up for our customers because he deserved a world that showed up for him.
We create with intention because legacy isn’t built by accident.

Every bracelet, every necklace, every piece that leaves our hands carries the name of my son.
And his name carries my heart.

If there’s anything I hope readers take from this, it’s this:
life will break all of us at some point.
Maybe not in the same way, maybe not with the same weight, but no one gets through this world untouched.
And yet—somehow—there is still room for beauty.
There is still room for purpose.
There is still room to build something good from the ashes.

J. Parker is my beauty for ashes.
And I’m grateful you’re here, sharing in the story.

---