Yvonne Watterson Writing

More about Yvonne

Yvonne Watterson is a Northern Irish-born writer and educator, now based near Guadalajara, Mexico. Her career in public education spans 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. Yvonne's writing life began in November 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 beyond this blog in The Irish Times, Irish Central, Reading Ireland, and other outlets. Yvonne's 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. Most recently, 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, a six-piece Americana ensemble based in Ajijic, Mexico and she plays violin in the Lake Chapala Community Orchestra. Her daughter, Sophie, also a writer, lives in Arizona. “If you have the words, there's always a chance that you'll find the way.” ― Seamus Heaney

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. Most recently, 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 and she plays violin in the Lake Chapala Community Orchestra. Her daughter, Sophie, is also a writer, living in Arizona.

#MeToo, Dispatch from the Diaspora, Supreme Court of the United States

Over to you, boys. Do the right thing.

September 28, 2018 / No Comments

It’s four o’clock in the morning. Sleep eludes me. I can’t stop thinking about her, the intelligent middle-aged woman who sat where 27 years ago Dr. Anita Hill sat facing some of the same men – white, powerful, aging men. One of them, Orrin Hatch, stands out in my memory, in the ways he belittled Dr. Hill’s story of sexual assault…

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Dispatch from the Diaspora, Feminism, Mother Daughter Relationship, Mothering, Sexual Harassment

Kavanaugh, Cosby, Weinstein – Counting on us to be Quiet

September 24, 2018 / No Comments

Today 81 year old Bill Cosby is waiting to learn his fate, facing up to 30 years behind bars for three counts of aggravated indecent assault against the woman whose allegations led to the criminal case against him. He continues to deny her allegations and those of the scores of women who came forward against him. Remorseless, he maintains to…

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9.11.2013, 9/11, Anything can Happen, Belfast, Billy Collins, Blogging, bombing, British Army, cancer, Diary, Dispatch from the Diaspora, Healing Field Tempe, Loss, Memoir, Memoir, Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland Culture, Ordinary Things, Peace, Poetry, Remembering September 11th, Seamus Heaney, September 11, The Peace Process, The Troubles, The Troubles, Themes of Childhood, Writers

The Last Name on the List on the Eleventh of September

September 10, 2018 / 2 Comments

I have yet to be disappointed by what happens when my online world collides with its ‘real’ counterpart. Landing on the virtual doorsteps of people in the middle of lives parallel to my own, I have been beautifully blindsided by unexpected coincidences and exchanges of truths that may not otherwise have seen the light of day. In my virtual home, it…

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Death of parent, Dispatch from the Diaspora, Father's Day, Fatherless daughters, learning to drive, Milestones, riding a bicycle

just like riding a bike . . . happy father’s day

June 16, 2018 / No Comments

“The first grip I ever got on things Was when I learnt the art of pedalling (By hand) a bike turned upside down, and drove Its back wheel preternaturally fast.” ~ from Wheels within Wheels by SEAMUS HEANEY My first bike arrived on Christmas morning, 1967. It had training wheels, or “stabilizers” as we called them in Northern Ireland. Stabilizers – my…

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