I feel a bit like Cassandra. It is not so much that no one listens to my prophecies, it is just that they don’t help me much in navigating life. Recently, the Netflix short run series KAOS had a good turn at an updated Cassandra in the person of actress Billie Piper. Ms. Piper has not been able to do any wrong by me since her days as the Doctor’s companion. Apropos of this being a watch themed site, KAOS prominently featured a watch, one that I will never own on principle (electronic digital display watches being one of the portends of the end of civilization, like the extinction of cursive writing, and yes, I am serious).
A few months ago, I wrote about my aunt’s sense of style as a woman of the 1970’s. Just weeks after capturing a little bit of a larger-than-life woman I had to attend her funeral. My family is spread all over the continent, so we sometimes only see each other at weddings and funerals, and I am not good at attending weddings. I met one of my first cousins for the first time. I had to remind the others that I was the first-born cousin. It is my special burden.
But watching over all of the family members assembled there, some on their third marriages or second knees, the youngest still in need of a nap, a thought came to me unbidden: oh, this is just the beginning. I have been lucky. Today we uplift my cousins. My turn in the chute is coming. Yeah, I wish that I hadn’t incepted that particular idea into being. But the thought was “unbidden” after all.
Here is a little Gruen from about 1944. I believe that it is a VeriThin “Lyons”. Gruen model names were often uninspiring. It is difficult even to find them. Gruen threw away all of their records in 1958. Obsessives have been trying to piece together basic information for decades.
I didn’t always think of myself as a collector. I had stamps, comic books, baseball cards, and beer cans as a youth. They were fads that came and went. I had one fountain pen for twenty years. I had between five and seven watches, neither having the inclination nor money to have more.
My collecting impulse seems to have been propelled by boredom. I had an idle thought and wanted to know what happened to the American watch industry. So, I surrounded myself with the fossil remains of what had been as I unwound the great “Quartz Crisis” lie. This Gruen fits the pattern of my inquiry. Pictured here is the ritual “finding of the least worst strap” that comes with each vintage purchase:
It normally takes me a while to figure out what color or texture works best with each watch. The Lyons is on its provisional strap until I figure out something more permanent.
Things are about to get interesting for me professionally and personally. And “interesting” covers a lot of ground. Last year in October I tried a murder case and gave my “deep” thoughts on watch selection. The State has me lined up again next month for another murder trial. But, unlike last year, my little gold totems will not guarantee a win. The moral compass of the Universe probably dictates that I take this one on the chin. Bad facts. I don’t have the head space this year to overly worry about what watch I wear on day two.
My boredom is about to be over. Life is going to start throwing some wrinkles my way, as I predicted. Thankfully, I am healthy and not easily panicked. However, I am not of a mind to tell you my opinion about homages. I don’t care that Christopher Ward is going upmarket. I have no thoughts about Rolex worth committing to the internet. I will not tell you if I like the blue dial more than the black one. I will not pick out your next watch for you. You wouldn’t like it if I did. It would look suspiciously like a Gruen VeriThin “Lyons”.
An underrated positive aspect of a large collection is that I can soothe myself to sleep by trying to figure out in my mind what watch to wear for the next day based on my own internal criteria. It can crowd out unpleasant thoughts. Those are coming for me. I may just have to find wherever Kaysia is hiding and see if there is room for another.
The Escapement Room 