THE DAY I CAST OFF MY WATCH

Subtitle: And the day I put it back on

Santa Fe, NM, circa 1994.
It was spring break time of year {just like now} and I was in need of a getaway. My friend Karina called from NYC and said she was fed up and needed to blow the city for a while. So we decided to take Greyhound and meet up in Santa Fe for some kind of twenty-something angst trip.
My bus ride was about 36 hours from Utah. I think Karina's was in the ballpark of 60. That's some time on a bus, packed like Pringles with a lot of strangers and strange smells. Our plan to meet at the bus station worked perfectly and before long we were paying $13 each/night for a little dive hotel off the main drag. It was a perfect place. Phone booth out front. Little Spanish boy playing basketball in the courtyard at the crack of dawn. Hanging out with Karina, who at the time was a big Hemingway fan, too.
I guess the most defining moment of this trip, aside from seeing the GeorgiaO'Keeffe museum, was my liberation from the wrist watch. I remember making some poignant {or so it seemed at the time; you remember being in your twenties} statement about how I was finally tired of being a hostage to time and time limits and time frames. Then I took off my wrist watch and tossed it in the garbage. No looking back. No regrets.
Now, fourteen years later, I've decided it might be a good idea to wear a watch again. Does that mean I'm no longer a free spirit? Does it mean I'm completely corporate minded and a stuffed shirt? I hope not. I think what it means is that I still like to be spontaneous and free-spirited, I just need to know how much time I've got before I have to be back at the office.
Here's what I'm rockin' on my wrist now {mine is the black one}. It's the Rocker watch from Nixon.