The Purge

No keepers, just ones that last longer than the rest

I recently sold eight watches. I’m not hard up for cash, but every once in a while, often in the fall for some reason, I feel the need to thin out. It’s not just my watch collection that gets ruthlessly edited. Shoes, books, backpacks, and jackets—I have WAY too many jackets— are also subject to the purge. I apply the same criteria to everything: if I haven’t worn it much, or at all, in the past year (or season), and if I don’t have a sentimental attachment to it, it goes. No regrets, no looking back. I used to feel seller’s remorse for some watches, like my departed Omega Ploprof or my vintage Rolex GMT-Master, but I’ve become much more sanguine about it in recent years. I had my fun with it, now someone else can, and I can always appreciate these things without having to own them. Especially with watches, which are functional objects, I feel like if it’s not being used, it ceases to have a place in my life. 

Four years ago (!) I wrote a story here about those watches I will never sell, and I nervously re-read that to see if indeed I still have them all. I do. I called that article, “The Keepers,” but in truth, if I really think about it, everything is expendable, given the right circumstances. I’m finding Watches, with a capital “W” less interesting these days, but on the other hand, I might just be enjoying watches more now that I take them less seriously and do less professionally around covering the industry. I might go for a week with a Timex Ironman on my wrist that my chum, James, gave me, enjoying the nostalgia of wearing the same watch I used to run with in high school. Lately I’ve been pretty much wearing my Tudor Pelagos FXD, which is about as easy to wear as anything, given its light weight, soft adjustable strap, durability, and accuracy. It’s like a default watch when I don’t want to think about my watch. And it might just be on that exclusive “keepers” list now, given that it was a gift from Tudor, suitably engraved on the caseback. 

Another recent addition to the keeper catalog is my vintage Breitling Navitimer. Even more than my ’68 Speedmaster, the Navitimer channels a mid-century aura that I find utterly bewitching. Sure, this watch has a killer backstory, but for me, it comes down to pure aesthetics (most watches do, let’s face it), and a connection with an era of aviation and derring-do that I have long been fascinated with. It’s fairly impractical, given its complete lack of water resistance, relative fragility, and incomprehensible slide rule. But the heart wants what the heart wants, as the saying goes. And I do wear it often, and find myself lost in its gilt dial and perfect proportions.

I’ve written on more than one occasion about being a reluctant watch collector, or even whether I’m a collector at all. I even had a person cancel a Substack subscription due to the “negativity” of my attitude towards watches. I have tended to bond with the watches I acquire, using them on adventures, and then continue to add memories to them. That never struck me as the classic collector mentality, which always seemed more calculating and strategic. But the funny thing is, as I get more casual in my attitudes about watches, and the less I “care” about them, the more I feel like a collector, a guardian of these timepieces, who will enjoy them while they’re here, but not averse to moving them on. I still don’t scheme to own watches based on their perceived value or investment potential. But the way I see it, if a watch’s ultimate final function for me is to pay off a home mortgage, or a car repair, then that’s more useful to me than  taking it on a dive somewhere.

Speaking of diving, another recent “keeper” is my Blancpain Fifty Fathoms, that was given me by Blancpain in appreciation for a couple of events I helped them with. I’ve now had that watch on several diving adventures, from ice diving locally, to chasing hammerheads in French Polynesia, to two Channel Islands expeditions. The connection with the brand, combined with the adventures we’ve shared, and its drop dead good looks means it’ll be with me for a good many years. I guess it appears that, though I’ve been selling off a fair number of watches, the keeper list also continues to grow. Two steps forward, one step back, though I’m not sure that’s an accurate way of putting it.

I suppose if one were to psychoanalyze my shift in philosophy about watches, you might connect it with recent changes in my life, new perspectives on permanence and sentimentality versus living in the moment, and a newfound pragmatism. The fact is, I have a dog now, and dogs cost money and take a certain commitment and focus. Also I have two Land Rovers to feed and maintain, and believe me, they’re even hungrier and needier than a dog, if equally loyal and fun. The Defender has been in the shop for over a month getting a chassis repair and new wiring harness. Worth it for sure, but it also means that my Zodiac Super Sea Wolf that I didn’t wear much became more useful to me as a source of some spending money. And the person who bought it already sent me a photo of it, covered in surfboard wax after a session in the waves. That, to me, is a win-win. 

Thinning out is addictive. There’s something so satisfying about winnowing down, reducing clutter, shedding excess. It just feels… lighter. I once said that if my house was burning, there’s nothing I would bother to save, except, well, now, my dog, and if I have a watch on my wrist—any watch—I’ll be fine watching it all burn. I still feel that way. It would be a pity if all the history imbued in that old Navitimer, my Pelagos, or my 40th birthday Rolex, were to melt into indistinguishable lumps of metal. But we’re all heading that way anyway. The universe, and everything in it, is constantly decaying. Rust never sleeps. The beauty of watches is, they tend to last, and be more useful, longer than most things. But that doesn’t mean I have to hold on to them forever. I don’t use the word forever anymore. Some just stay longer than the rest.

P.S. Shameless plug: the Rolex Explorer at the top is still for sale, by the way.