Life is Short....A Consolidation

[Maiden]

Hello all. I thought I would share a story, a part of my watch journey. It will be a little different than a some of the threads on here, probably a little longer, and hopefully not too personal. In any event I just want to share.

Like many here I have been a watch enthusiast since I was a child. I have owned many great watches over the years and about 10 years ago I was fortunate to get in that place in life where I had a good career, finances were all in place, and I could purchase more expensive watches, many of which were Rolex. I had built a core collection of three great watches, a 114060, 116613lb and a day date 18238. This was a great spot for me, these watches were owned free and clear and it was a value amount that I personally was "comfortable" with in having money tied up in watches. I could spend more but this is what worked for me. I appreciate this is different for everyone. Sure there are some other watches I desired but all in good time.

Last July I was diagnosed with cancer. After an 8 hour surgery I was told that due to all the additional disease I had, my previous high probability of a 5 year survival (I am 52) was off the table. I needed to wait for further biopsy results, and if they were not favourable I was looking at maybe a year.

Quite a blow, and during that time of course one does a lot of thinking of all the things they have in their life and what they have to be thankful for. Watches of course are way down the list. The time did come though, when I thought what I would do with my small collection, who would I leave them to? Sell? In any event in the process my wonderful wife made it clear that if there was ANY watch I wanted I could purchase it.

I did some thinking about this and maybe strangely enough, I thought No? I do not want a bucket list watch. I was proud of and probably should be much happier with what I have instead of lusting after other watches. So I made a deal with myself that if the biopsy results came back in my favor I would purchase a "grail" watch, a watch I have always wanted to own more accurately, and fund it by moving two from my collection. Not a penny more. This watch would be worn proudly and it will be the "fight" watch as I would still have a heck of a battle ahead of me.

I am happy to say the biopsy results came back in my favor. Still cancer mind you, but not the aggressive untreatable type. So the quest begins....Firstly the watch. For me folks it is the five digit gold submariner, reference 16618 LN. I own six digit subs and love them but for the gold this is MY love. Second what do I sell, well I moved on my beloved day date 18238 and my mint GMT 16713 (I recently acquired the GMT plus cash for my 116613lb) The challenge, the proceeds must fund the gold sub. Not a penny more.

I have been looking for more than 6 months, its been a challenge. I am in Canada and its a touch place to buy a gold sub especially at the price I needed. It generally looked like I was going to be about 1-3k shy based on pricing. I pulled out all the stops, trusted sellers, visited Florida and looked everywhere but no dice in my price range. I was looking for a clean example that I could wear everyday. I didn't care about collectability, condition was king. Service dial and bezel and working lume, fine by me!

Anyhow I was getting impatient, my wife was on board with me adding a bit of extra cash to get clean example but I wanted to keep the deal I made with myself. Well finally my friends, on Monday I found an excellent condition P serial 16618 from a reputable Toronto dealer. I couldn't believe it, great condition, tight bracelet, wow. He did a fantastic deal with me and I was able to purchase the watch for less than the sum of the sale of my previous two watches! There was one little hitch though, it was a serti dial. This is where this hobby is great though and the people are great. I spoke to my local independent dealer (who was working like heck to find me a clean 16618) and he is going to swap the bezel and dial out for me to the LN plus give me cash as the serti dial has more value! A win win.

So that is my story guys, I have enclosed a few pics of the serti dial as we all know threads need pics. I look forward to posting pics of this as LN in a couple of weeks. So I have consolidated down to a two watch collection, a 16618 and a 114060...and I couldn't be happier. I have been truly blessed, and I wish the best for you all.