The Meistersinger N°01, a one handed watch. I never understood it. How will you know exactly what time it is? How do you sync your watch precisely and know how accurate it is? How will you know how long you have until the train comes? How do you know how much longer you have in your lunch break? What if you need to time.. oh, I dunno.. an egg?

I am reminded of a famous quote – “I have a phone that can tell me the time” (anon). Last year, as I approached 30 years of age, after five or six years enjoying this utterly ridiculous hobby of ours I realised something. They’re right. I took a look at my life, the way I set my watches to the exact second so I can get the satisfaction of seeing it has only gained a couple of seconds in a week, or the disappointment that it’s lost a minute overnight. The fact that in my work as an air traffic controller I have no less than five clocks on my line of sight all day and every second of my day counts. I physically write the time probably a couple hundred times a day, notating taxi, landing and take off times for every aircraft. It occurred to me that on my days off, I really don’t care what the exact minute or second it is at any point in my day.

I decided it was time to go on the hunt for a new weekend watch, straight to the Meistersinger cabinet! The brief was simple – hand wound movement, no date, no minutes, no seconds. Something that would set the scene for my precious days off.

The 43mm N°01 and N°02 fit the bill but the lugs were just too long for my wrists. There were some other Meistersinger models in the 40mm case size that wore perfectly but had dates and auto movements. I finally found the Meistersinger N°01 40mm online and managed to get one from the US with the help of a friend. It was love at first wind. Every weekend starts the same now. Coffee, wind watch, set time, take a breath, slow down.

I finally understand it.