the rolex saga, part one

Hannah models the model of Rolex I had, as well as my self-conscious gesture.

This is not a holiday story, but it is about gifts and commercialism and family, so it is appropriate to the season.
   The beginning of the story is this: My then-husband Douglas gifted me (yes, a horrid locution) with a watch back in the 1980s. He had always liked watches—I bought him a Rolex in Jamaica on our honeymoon—and he thought I needed a fancy one. I had been wearing a tiny art deco watch that you had to wind. So he bought me the watch being modeled by our daughter above.
  I liked it. I didn't have to wind it, it was waterproof, and it told me what day i was. All I had to do was change the date once in a while, and the time, if I was in a different time zone. I never took it off, and when I consulted my watch, approximately every 30 seconds, I crooked my pinkie as if I were sipping a genteel cup of tea. That pose, too, is being modeled by my daughter, above. Everyone made fun of me for it—especially my brother-in-law's girlfriend, Barrett—but I couldn't help myself.
    Like I said, I never took the watch off. Until it stopped. On Everest. While there was a Rolex-sponsored expedition also on the mountain. At 22,000 feet. Boy was I pissed!
    That was 1991. I was 40.

Coming up: The Rolex Saga, Part Two!