vited to speak, though. “San Francisco
is a one-party town,” he said. (Manny’s
has hosted seventeen of the Democratic
Presidential candidates.)
Yekutiel wore purple nail polish and
a T-shirt that read “What Will You Do
About It?” He said, “I hadn’t heard of
Marianne before this. But we had a de-
bate watch party here the other night”—
for the second Democratic debate,
where Williamson walked onstage
blowing a kiss and went viral after de-
scribing Trump’s “dark psychic force of
collectivized hatred”—“and she brought
the house down.” He added, “I’m going
to put on some Janet Jackson while we
wait.” Seventeen minutes later, Wil-
liamson showed up, in a blue lace blouse,
suède pants, and silver-and-black heels.
She took the stage in front of a mural
of San Francisco community activists.
“The conventional political estab-
lishment in this country is too narrow
a container for the energies which must
emerge at this time,” she said. “What
lies in front of us are two choices: en-
lightenment or fascism... .It’s gonna
get either really light, or really dark.”
The crowd snapped their fingers. A
few people called out, “Preach!” “This
is a good time to go buy one of those
‘American History for Dummies’
books,” she continued. “When it comes
to the history of the United States—
just like the history of your family,
when you go to therapy,” she said,
“you’re empowered by an understand-
ing of your history.”
Yekutiel joined Williamson onstage.
“You’re a Spiritualist, correct?” he asked.
“Well, I think that word technically
means you make the table bump up and
down,” she said. “I’m a spiritual seeker.”
Afterward, supporters lined up to
meet the candidate. Many had brought
copies of her campaign book, “A Poli-
tics of Love,” for her to sign. “Mari-
anne says that everything starts in Cal-
ifornia,” Victoria Joyce, who works on
a local farm, said. “I was a teen-ager
here fifty years ago, running around
dressing like Janis Joplin. I like Mari-
anne because she dresses like me.”
Nearby stood Sean Batir, an A.I. de-
veloper who discovered Williamson
through his meditation group. (“To be
in tech, you’ve got to be able to sustain
meditative focus,” he said.) Batir wore
a neo-Tom Wolfe suit of white skinny
“Do you ever wish our silences were still uncomfortable?”••
jeans and a white blazer. “I recently
‘came out’ as Republican in San Fran-
cisco,” he said. “The first question you
get is: ‘Do you hate yourself ?’ ” He went
on, “Republicans believe in bringing
power to the self. Marianne has a vi-
sion of fixing ourselves from within—
there’s a parallel there. I have a lot of
Republican friends in the Bay Area
who support her. It’s a subcommunity.”
Williamson approached the crowd.
She was waylaid by a man who claimed
to be “the architect of the nonviolent
2011 Egyptian revolution, living in
exile.” He told her, “I am the living em-
bodiment of many of the things that
you say,” and pressed a business card
into her hands. “I bet you miss your
country,” Williamson said. She stepped
outside, where a line of fans snaked
around a man who was sitting on a
blanket, selling sports trophies and mis-
matched shoes. “I lived here in the nine-
teen-seventies,” Williamson said, of
San Francisco. “This is my larger phil-
osophical tribe.”
A supporter draped her in a purple
crystal necklace. “This whole crystal
thing is ridiculous,” Williamson said.
“I have no crystals in my home. I have1
EARTHFIRSTDEPT.
ENDZONE
T
he recent legalization of human
composting in Washington State
has left many feeling squirmy and dis-
tracted. So let’s take a moment to air
our concerns about this novel form of
eco-burial. Please feel free to unburden
yourself of any knee-jerk thoughts typ-
ically ascribed to fourteen-year-old boys.
This is a safe space.
Yes—you in the back, in the red shirt?
“Would you start by briefly outlining
the process of human composting for us?”
Of course. The brainchild of Katrina
Spade, the founder and C.E.O. of the
Seattle-based startup Recompose, humannever used crystals in my work. That’s
just part of this caricature that’s been
created.” She went on, “I’m a Jewish
woman. I practice Transcendental Med-
itation. I do yoga.”
—Antonia Hitchens