I’ve always loved watches. When I was a child, my maternal grandfather owned a small jewelry shop in Baltimore. I never think about him without thinking about watches. My brother and I would go visit him traveling by train from Annapolis. I was fascinated by the watches and clocks he repaired. I could watch him work for hours on end. They were beautiful, delicate and, sometimes, pretty loud. Some were so small I wondered how he could work on them; however, he had an eyepiece and tiny little instruments to help him. And, he wore a green visor.

He lived above the shop and when we stayed overnight, we could hear the clanging of the trolley car outside his windows. He had a tall grandfather clock at home that made noise you could hear all over the house. It chimed on the hour and was very comforting to hear. I still own a small grandfather clock.

Growing up, people seemed to only give me watches that had stretchable gold bands that pinched my skin if I wasn’t careful about how I put them on. No nice comfortable leather bands or other soft materials to protect my skin from those nicks and pinches. Ouch!

Their faces were tiny with hands so small it was hard to see the time. They were mechanical and had to be wound just about everyday. There was no such thing as an automatic or self-winding watch. You wound it yourself. In fact, I was always winding mine so tightly that the springs would invariably pop and that was the end of that.

If I left my watch in a drawer for a while, it stopped running or it lost time. No backlighting so you could see the time in the dark. They were not water-resistant or splash-proof, so if I forgot and got water splashed in it, it just died! They were not very durable, either. Lots of maintenance was required and I never seemed to get them repaired; it was not convenient in my small home town, so I always had a drawer of old broken watches.

It was not until the early sixties that watch manufacturers and designers began to promote ladies watches. This effort resulted in larger watches with a variety of comfortable and fashionable bands. Previously, there was very little innovation in timepieces for women. There were no sports watches or watches for a soccer mom or professional woman that you could wear without having to worry about how you treated it.

Watches for women have undergone a welcome change. Some are luxurious, long-lasting, trendy. Others are fashionable appearing in a variety of colors and shapes; including animal, flower, star. I love the fact that you can have one in every color for every outfit and every occasion, if you like. There are even watches inside of watches, kind of like picture in picture TV.

Some are self-winding and feature feminine creative styling as well as elegance and sophistication. There are watches for those women who appreciate traditional watch-making values and like to own a strongly personalized timepiece designed exclusively for them. Many are virtual works of art and range anywhere from less than three hundred dollars to over thousands of dollars much like works of fine art.

I was surprised to learn recently that American watches were once among the highest quality watches in the world. They timed the rail-roads, coordinated the movements of armies and were used for air and sea navigation. I thought the Swiss always had that distinction. Apparently not. The American watch industry has a fascinating history.

Looking today, watches can do everything from going underwater to waking you up to starting computers. They are more accurate and useful, water-proof, shock-proof, and more rugged. They are designed and made to keep up with our active lifestyles in the 21st century. I, for one, however, still feel a sense of the delicacy and beauty of some of the old watches I saw early on in that jewelry shop of my granddad. The thought brings me some pleasant childhood memories.

Angela Baden is a former practicing attorney, teacher and personal chef, turned internet marketer. She is the founder of DivaBiz Enterprises and Millionaire Health Secrets. She is a student of the Master Key System and a member of The Prosperity Cast Network. She is enthusiastic about having been in the Marketing/Networking Industry for over 4 years. She shares her considerable knowledge with others to help them succeed in life and in business from home. For more information call 206-305-2120 or go to http://www.divabizinc.com