My Personal Apple Timeline (A Tribute to Steve Jobs)

I was 17 when I met my first Apple.

My dad brought it home and I thought it was the greatest thing ever.

I loved the floppy diskettes (which really were floppy, as in bendable) and I loved the green glowing letters on the screen as I typed my high school English assignments onto the computer. It was as close to magic as anything I’d ever seen. While my younger brother enjoyed playing Pong on the Apple, all I wanted to do was write on it.

Move over electric typewriter, welcome personal computer!

That summer, my dad took me on the “let’s look at colleges” Junior year pilgrimage. Every campus I visited bragged about having a state-of-the-art computer lab, outfitted with none other than bright shiny Apple computers. (As an English major, my entire college career was predicated on having constant access to the Apple lab.)

When I became a teacher a few years later, I bought my very own Apple, which by then was called the Macintosh. My guess is, if you are reading this post, you remember those funny little alien-like desktops with the even tinier screens. But boy oh boy were they cool! And powerful.

More writing ensued.

When I went to work for a business college in 2001, I transitioned away from Apple to PCs, as they were the machines of choice at that particular institution and would become mine for the next eight years. In fact, I wouldn’t come back to Apple again until 2009, when I bought my first iPhone. But I never forgot my first love, and lusted after friends’ Macbooks and desktops on many occasions throughout those years.

And let me tell you, that was a glorious day, friends, when I walked out of the AT&T store with my brand new white iPhone 3G tucked under my arm. I felt like I was 17 again, back in my father’s study sitting in front of that very first Apple ii that gave me so much joy and inspired my lifelong love for technology and computers.

Today, the world lost somebody very special when Steve Jobs died. I learned of his passing from NPR as I was driving home to fix dinner, and since then, I have been distracted, and I’d even say, a bit down. I didn’t know Steve Jobs personally, but because his professional contributions were larger than life and touched mine in many ways, it felt like I did.

I always wonder in the wake of a death, especially the death of someone famous (and a multi-billionaire to boot), what things they thought about in their final days, what they believed were their greatest contributions to life.  56 is too young to go, and shows you that illness doesn’t care about how many zeroes are in your bank account. I wonder what other magical creations Steve Jobs could have invented had he been granted a different sentence.

I know I speak for many when I say:

“Thank you, Steve Jobs. For your spirit of innovation, your creative mind, and your zeal for building something that matters. You have left behind a legacy few will ever forget, and I, for one, am deeply grateful. You will be missed.”