Maurel Avery Watson

It is with a heavy heart that I announce the death of our youngest son, Maurel Avery Watson.

He was born in Ft. Riley, Kansas on September 14, 1996 to Miles Anthony Watson Sr. (father),

Monique Helene Watson (mother) and Miles Anthony Watson Jr (brother). We are a military family so he was born in Kansas and we lived there until he was 4 years old in the year 2000. We then relocated to Ft. Hood Tx located in Killeen Tx when and remained there until Maurel was age 11 and his father retired from the Army after 23 years of service. After my husband's retirement in 2008 we moved to Katy Tx our current residence so that my husband could pursue employment at HEB. Maurel never married nor did he have any children.

Maurel attended Cedar Creek Elementary in Killeen Tx from ages 6-11 years old. Woodcreek Middle school from ages 12-14 years old. Seven Lakes High School from ages 13-17 years old. He then went on to attend University of Houston from 2016-2020 and graduated with a B.A. in English and a minor in languages.

Maurel loved to read and write. He dreamed of becoming a Polyglot and he studied Chinese in school in addition to speaking Spanish with friends. He loved peanut butter and Snickerdoodle cookies.

Maurel was a very social person. He had a smile that could light up a room. He loved to be around people and he was very observant of details. He was an out of the box thinker. He could walk into any conversation and meaningfully contribute to any topic.

Maurel is survived by his father Miles Watson Sr, mother Monique Watson, and brother Miles Watson Jr. He is preceded in death by 2 of his favorite people his grandfather Samuel Peterson Sr and grandmother Benita Peterson.

We cannot begin to express how heart broken we are. Maurel was a light in our lives that will never fade. We take comfort in knowing that Maurel is safe, happy, and surrounded by people who love him. We know that he is still with us in spirit and we thank God for the 28 years that we were blessed with his presence.

Maurel was an exceptional writer; hence the English degree. The following is an entrance letter that he wrote to a law school that he applied to in 2021:

Maurel Watson (Fisher)

Law school personal statement

My desire to become a polyglot stems from a wall I wanted to dissipate in my youth. I'm an army

brat raised in a military town. In my early years everyone in my environment for the most part was

black or puerto rican and although we all couldn't understand each other , a smile was universal.

Towards the end of my childhood I realized I could connect with more people if I spoke Spanish. As

I became more educated I realized a lot of disputes and confrontational issues occur between people

due to miscommunication. Today Spanish is the second most spoken language in the world , followed

by English and Chinese of course. Hence the reason I minored in Chinese in college. We would have a

lot less problems globally if we all understood each other and I feel as though part of the problem

is ignorance and lack of effort. My Chinese is horrendous in my opinion but I always seemed to get

the sweetest responses when I would exercise the language from native speakers and they'd be more

inclined to interact with me. My desire to become an attorney is intertwined within my desire to

dissipate barriers between cultures and become sewed together within my environment. I want to

contribute to the war of social equity: domestically, globally, and economically. Through the

pursuit and focus of tax law I'd like to help minorities and people from different cultures

establish themselves and their families well being's in America. The more I can learn to appreciate

other cultures the more I can educate others on how to appreciate my own and contribute to making

more and more people privy of how much we've got in common rather than how much different we are.

Life isn't a "me" movement, life is a we movement. Law school is my first major stop on the road of

change. Where not only will I give all my effort to become a more humanitarian individual but

where I'll also be exposed to heavy incentives of social activism and seek a mentor to help me

narrow my vision, if offered admission. I will cultivate the improvement of my character through

the representation of my time spent in law school. One race does not take precedence over another

in my eyes , and the law was not made to protect the government , it was made to protect the

people. It wasn't until I started seriously pursuing Chinese in my mid teen years I was reminded of

this fact. It shouldn't be black vs. white , or asian vs. black. This is bigger than me, it's about

all of us. And as an attorney and a man who speaks the world's three most spoken languages there

shouldn't be a soul on earth I can't connect with positively. Once I went to college and spoke more

and more Chinese in my later years I adopted a group of mostly immigrants as my close friends. &

slowly but surely day by day I was reminded that we're all really not that different. Just people

with different skin tones trying to make a better way. Social equity is about all of us, there's no

I in team, but there will always be a "we" in wealth. As a society one could argue we will only

truly see change through the power of love. The more connected our cultures are the more love we'll

learn to harbor for one another, and the more love

we'll have for the improvement of our society as a whole.