It seems ironically unfortunate that my last post here was when Steve Jobs resigned on August 24, 2011, and sadly the time has come to properly eulogize a man respected by so many.
My own experience with Apple goes as far back as 1987, when my parents brought home a fully loaded Apple IIgs. As a kindergartener, my first experiences with computers involved mousing around in Apple Paint and slowly typing out letters to my grandparents using AppleWorks 1.0, then passing them off to an Apple ImageWriter that I liked to nod rhythmically with while it spit out dot matrix text and images. A few years later I used my first Macintosh at a friend’s house, remembering vividly being shown a bitmapped recreation of the famous silhouetted image of the band Queen, painstakingly drawn by my best friend’s older brother. “Wow,” I thought to myself, “this is something I have to have.” Steve Jobs was not on my radar until many years later.
Fast forward to 1995: my family had just purchased a new Power Macintosh 6400 and a modem. The Mac was by my side the first time I got online. I even remember late nights when I would sneak into my family’s home office while my parents slept and I would muffle the obnoxious modem with a pillow while it went through handshaking with the world. I spent hours surfing the net, mostly fascinated by the Mac itself as I learned how to break it, resurrect it, tweak it, and make it my own. These are some of my most cherished memories of my early teen years. But then things got better. Enter Steve Jobs.
The internet was abuzz that the man was back! But who was he? I took the time to learn about him creating the Macintosh in 1984, only to be fired and forced into exile years later. And now Steve’s new company, NeXT, was being purchased by Apple in hopes to save the company. By this point I was completely hooked, enamored by the company teetering on the edge of failure, and even more eager to learn more about the man tasked with saving it. And to think all it took was a tiny blue and bulbous machine known as the iMac.
Four iMacs later, two PowerBooks, and plus an uncountable number of iPods, I began to live Apple. I imagine I would frustrate my friends when we would get together as the majority of what I wanted to talk about were innovations spearheaded by Apple and most notably Steve Jobs. They flattered me, let me continue on, and I even convinced a handful of people to purchase their first Macs. It was always a joy to see them finally appreciate things on the same level, letting the technology step aside enough so that they could accomplish tasks as human beings, and not end up in a game of tug-of-war with the machine. This is the essence of Steve Jobs’ aim when he created the products he loved so much at Apple.
Today as an adult and most especially a father, I am grateful to Steve Jobs for his vision and desire to shape our world. I help our children with their homework using their iMac. My youngest son could operate an iPod Touch shy of his 2nd birthday and loves learning on my iPad. I continue to be amazed and grateful knowing that new friends and ideas are just the press of a button away, let alone waiting for us in the pockets of our pants. Thank you, Steve, for being such a brilliant visionary, as I am grateful to have walked the earth during the best years of your life. Our paths may have never crossed, but you’ve always felt like a friend. The world is an insanely great place because of your contributions and this brief essay is but a small tribute to your life and a thank you to your family. You will be missed.