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.

Arizona Humane Society, Chihuahuas, Dog Rescue, Dogs, Door into the Dark, Greyhound, Loss, Love, Mary Oliver, Memoir, Rites of passage, Seamus Heaney, Starting over, The Midnight Anvil

for national puppy day – an emotional rescue

March 23, 2016 / No Comments

A dog can never tell you what she knows from the smells of the world, but you know, watching her, that you know almost nothing. ~ Mary Oliver, Dog Songs First there was Molly, a retired racer who loved me. We had rescued her in the Christmas of 2008, on the heels of a spectacular crisis in my professional life, and…

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Language of Cancer, Leontia Flynn, Memoir, Northern Ireland, Rituals, Seamus Heaney, Themes of childhood

poetry – the charm of it

March 21, 2016 / No Comments

For World Poetry Day 2016. The freedom and the lovely uselessness of poetry is its whole point. ~ Leontia Flynn My parents were raised in rural County Derry, in Heaney country, where they learned to be thrifty and resourceful, and also – when all else failed – to believe in the mystical powers of “folk healers,” those individuals uniquely gifted…

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Awesome Women, Breast Cancer Advocacy, Breast Cancer Awareness, Cancer Language, Culture of breast cancer, Diagnosis, Early Detection, Facebook, Family, Health, Language of Cancer, Mammograms, Memoir, Mother Daughter Relationship, Pink Ribbon Culture, Pink Ribbons, Social Media, Twitter, Wilfred Owen, World Cancer Day, Writing

world cancer day & the real warrior in my house

February 4, 2016 / 7 Comments

My breast cancer is not just about me as I discovered when my then fourteen year old daughter decided to break her silence about it. In her own way, on her Facebook wall, and on World Cancer Day 2012. Thus, on this day designated for speaking up and out, from 2016 -2018 focusing on how everyone – as a collective or individually…

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Act Two, Being a Widow, Death and dying, Dispatch from the Diaspora, Dispatches from the Diaspora, Friendship, Happy New Year, James Gandolfini, Love, magic and loss, Maurice Sendak, Milestones, saying goodbye, Seamus Heaney, Starting over, Ted Kooser, Time

We’ll Take A Cup of Kindness Yet . . .

December 31, 2015 / 28 Comments

Life isn’t some vertical or horizontal line — you have your own interior world, and it’s not neat. ~ Patti Smith Beginnings and endings are rarely tidy as this New Year’s Eve reminds me. Again, I ponder how best to pack up the stuff of the past twelve months before stepping into the new year. Just begin. Pluck out a memory, wrap…

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