My son Jackson Hamilton, who has put in more time as a progressive activist at age 19 than most liberals do in a lifetime, decided his journey to liberal Evergreen State College on the left coast from South Carolina should be "Epic."
On Sunday night, a deliberately chosen September 11th., he boarded the Amtrak Silver Meteor in Charleston, SC to begin a 3000 mile, four day railroad Odyssey from our home, where our family has lived since 1694 to a new and more liberal life elsewhere.
Here is the video of his departure:
He visited Washington, DC Monday where guards with machine guns woke him up from a nap in a park near the Capital. This morning he is in Chicago, atop the Sears Tower, taking a look at America from the middle. He's seen a lot of rusted factories with broken windows along the railroad line but he assures us that much of the country is still beautiful. He's made some friends along the way.
He's young, opinionated and sometimes crass which is what 19 year olds making a break of this magnitude are often like when they're short on sleep. He is the fruit of his mother and I's love and the flower of our dreams.
You can follow his journey on Facebook, from Sea to shining sea if you like. I can't promise what he'll do next.Jackson Hamilton on Facebook
The house has been really quiet and a cry a lot, more than his mother, who has a more expansive confidence in a better world ahead than I. The line of people standing up for peace and justice in SC gets thinner every day and we'll miss him, but we are proud of him.
If you're out there and you see him, please help him along the way.