A Long Time Watching

When I turned 18, my mother bought me a watch. It took a long time, because she said to take my time and make sure it was one that I liked and that would last. I ended up buying a Citizen Quartz Titanium. Very light-weight, with some gold highlights and no ostentatious features beyond that, the watch has served me well. Its analogue face and insistence on 31-day months have grown to be part of the way I see time.

Today something disastrous happened. The piece of titanium that guards the clasp fell off, its hinge unbalanced by a small amount of dirt and corrosion. I don't know where it went. But for the first time since a hockey stick smashed its face 15 years ago, my watch is wounded and incomplete. I'm sad. My life has gone awry.

The watch has always been a survivor. It has only had to change its batteries twice in more than 20 years. I have always found some place that might repair it, put in new glass, put in a new battery, clean it in an ultrasound bath. But this piece? I'm not so sure they stock it anywhere anymore. I don't know what to do.