Yvonne Watterson
  • About
  • A Homing Bird
  • Subscribe Now
  • About
  • A Homing Bird
  • Subscribe Now
Yvonne Watterson

considering the lilies ©

More About Yvonne

More About Yvonne

More about Yvonne

Yvonne Watterson is a Northern Irish-born writer now living in Mexico. Her work has appeared in The Irish Times, Irish Central, Reading Ireland, and elsewhere. Yvonne's essays begin in all sorts of places - a song, a story, a ballpark, a polling place, a graveyard - but they return to the same complicated business of belonging to more than one place - what makes a place, a person, or a moment feel like home.

About Yvonne

From there to here . . . Yvonne Watterson is a Northern Irish-born writer and educator, now based near Guadalajara, Mexico. Her career in public education spans nearly 30 years, during which she led school reform initiatives featured in national outlets including The New York Times and Education Week. Her work as a high school principal in Arizona focused on equity, inclusion, and student advocacy, earning both local and national attention. Her writing life began in 2011, after an invasive breast cancer diagnosis sent her searching for answers online. What began as survival grew into a practice of storytelling, with her work appearing in The Irish Times, Irish Central, Reading Ireland, and other outlets. Her essays and reflections explore themes ranging from The Troubles in Northern Ireland and the poetry of Seamus Heaney to personal experiences of illness, loss, and resilience after being widowed in 2013. She compiled and edited Documented Dreams, a bilingual collection of letters documenting her advocacy with young immigrant students, and she contributed to Bravados: An Anthology, featuring 21 personal narratives by expats living in the Lake Chapala region. In 2025, she collaborated with Stephen Travers on The Bass Player – Surviving the Miami Showband Massacre. Yvonne’s social justice advocacy has earned her numerous honors, including the City of Phoenix Martin Luther King “Living the Dream” Award and the YWCA Tribute to Women Social Justice Leader Award. She is also a musician, performing with her partner, Scott Henrich, in The Old Souls Band, an Americana ensemble based in Ajijic, Mexico.

  • Dispatch from the Diaspora

    The World Cup. According to America.

    July 20, 2026 / No Comments

    The morning after every World Cup feels oddly quiet. It’s amazing how quickly you get used to arranging your life around football – and how strange it feels when there is suddenly no match to arrange it around. Then you start remembering what you’ll miss and somehow you find yourself convinced that the entire world has been waiting for your…

    Read More
    WordPress.com Support
  • Dispatch from the Diaspora

    The Long Way Home.

    July 12, 2026 / No Comments

    WordPress wished me a happy 17th anniversary this morning. Seventeen years. I confess I had completely lost track. I’ve also lost reading glasses, passwords, and the occasional parked car, so this felt entirely on brand. Still, it’s funny how one little notification can send you wandering backwards. I am a marker of time. It’s probably a very Irish habit. We…

    Read More
    WordPress.com Support
  • Dispatch from the Diaspora

    I Don’t Actually Like Sports. I Like People.

    July 7, 2026 / No Comments

    Click to get new essays for free My friends are asking why I keep writing about World Cup football. They know me after all. It’s a fair question because I’m not really writing about football. I’m writing about people. Which is probably why I’ve always loved great sports writers, even though I don’t really love sports. They’re writing about hope,…

    Read More
    WordPress.com Support
Copyright © & Usage 2026 Yvonne Watterson Writing - All rights reserved. All content published on this blog—including articles, images, and media—is the property of Yvonne Watterson , unless otherwise noted. Unauthorized use or duplication of this material without express written permission is strictly prohibited. You may share brief excerpts and links to blog posts for non-commercial purposes, provided that full and clear credit is given to Yvonne Watterson with a direct link to the original content. This blog is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License . Disclaimer The views expressed on this blog are solely those of the author and do not reflect the opinions of any organizations or affiliates. Some posts may include affiliate links, meaning I may earn a small commission—at no additional cost to you—if you choose to make a purchase through those links. These help support the blog and its content.