Margaret River Readers and Writers Festival: Day Three

I woke on my second day in Margaret River feeling exhausted, even though I’d had eight hours of sleep both nights.

Actually, no, that’s not true. I’d been in bed for eight hours both nights, but the bed was quite hard and uncomfortable, and I’d woken every hour to adjust my position and try again.

Still, I was in this beautiful place, and I was going to make the most of it.

After days of eating fatty foods and drinking wine, I was at that point in the weekend where I’d lost all interest in eating and drinking.

I decided to take a walk up the street to get a coffee. As I was leaving my hotel, I was greeted by two Australian Ringneck parrots on the footpath.

Although I only live three hours south of Margaret River, I never see birds this pretty back home. But then it got me wondering: am I just too busy to stop and look around when I’m at home?

After grabbing my coffee, I stopped by the local supermarket and picked up a banana and yoghurt for breakfast. I went back to my hotel and decided to eat on my balcony, where I was greeted with more Ringneck parrots in the tree.

Once everyone had checked out, my friends picked me up, and we drove to Busselton for our final event of the weekend:

In conversation with Sarah Wilson

As I’ve mentioned before, I’d never heard of any of the authors appearing at the festival, but one of my friends was interested in this session, and we all decided to tag along.

I also read the description for the event, and it said:

“Sarah shares honest insights into living with anxiety and offers a vision for rebuilding connection in today’s fragmented world.”

It sounded interesting, and it included a light brunch, so I was sold.

Unfortunately, I didn’t expect to leave the session feeling as unsettled as I did.

Now, to her credit, the first thing she said at the beginning of the talk was that we had to be a little uncomfortable in order to change our ways and grow.

And boy, was I uncomfortable.

To be honest, if I hadn’t been with a group of friends, I might have walked out after the first 15 minutes.

But that discomfort was the whole point of the discussion.

After telling us we needed to be uncomfortable, Sarah laid out her beliefs that our world is nearing collapse due to climate change, resource depletion, political differences, and artificial intelligence.

She touched on her ideas that AI will eventually end civilisation, partly because it is developed by “Tech Bros” who are trying to dictate societal norms.

She also used the term “the system is going down” several times.

Although I think she has some compelling arguments, this was all too much for my Sunday morning brunch. I was tired, wanted to get home to my family, and I’d just been told there would be no world left for my little boy when he gets older.

I started to lose her a little when she told us bunkers wouldn’t save us because we would still need security to guard those bunkers. Without security, people would just come by and steal our tins of corn.

My light brunch was so light, I’d eaten it all in the first five minutes and didn’t have anything to distract me from the heavy conversation going on in front of me.

Thankfully, the second half of the talk had a slightly positive spin on it.

Sarah went on to talk about what we can do to survive this system collapse. Most of her suggestions revolved around creating a community and learning to live without the creature comforts such as electricity and internet that we currently have.

She recommends going camping more, learning to garden, and getting your kids into Scouts.

She also suggested getting to know your neighbours because if this system actually collapses, we will all be able to band together and combine our skills to start our new life and community.

In the first session I attended, Sarah touched on art and artists. She stressed the importance of continuing to create art. Some people may see it as self-indulgent in these uncertain times, but it’s now more important than ever to document what’s happening in the world. Art can also be seen as a stress reliever, and we could all use a bit of that right now.

One of my favourite quotes from the session was:

“Have children, create art, be messy.”

Sarah has recently released a new book, I Eat the Stars, where she explores a lot of the themes she talked about at our session. I don’t think I’ll be reading her book. Although I think she might have some valid points, I just don’t have the headspace to delve into it any further.

Once the session was over, we continued our journey back to Perth, where I couldn’t wait to give my son a big hug and try to move on from the last couple of hours.

As a side note, although I loved the hotel I stayed at in Margaret River, I gave them a four-star Google review due to the uncomfortable bed.

Just this morning, they replied to my review with an apology. It turns out they had recently purchased a new double-sided mattress, but it had been set to the firm side rather than the plush side. They have now fixed the issue, so hopefully the next person has a much more comfortable stay.