When Apple announced last week that Steve Jobs was taking a leave of absence due to medical reasons, it made me feel a bit bummed out. Now, I don’t know Steve Jobs personally, but I do feel a genuine sadness to think that one day, he won’t be the CEO of Apple anymore.
Being in the design field, I do the lion’s share of my work on a Mac. Every computer I’ve ever owned has been an Apple. In fact, the very first computer I ever saw was a Mac. I have a very vivid memory of my first grade teacher taking us in groups of four to a room beside the principal’s office where we were in awe of the little beige box and the glowing monitor. I remember learning how to type in the RUN and DOS messages, but what really stands out in my memory is a game called Lemonade Stand. You would attempt to purchase the right amount of sugar, cups and lemons based on the weather forecast. Good times…
But getting back to my point, hearing Jobs was sick made me pause a moment. Some of his best ideas are the neat pieces of technology I have been using throughout my career. My first computer was a Macintosh Performa 6300. With it’s 100MHz of raw processing power I was in force to be reckoned with. Granted, it took nearly seven minutes to boot up and opening multiple applications was a recipe for disaster, but once it was up and running, it took my kerning skills to a whole new level.
A year or so later, my next purchase was the latest PowerMac G3. If I remember it was a sort of blue-green color and the monitor looked like something right out of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. After that there were a couple of iMacs – one that was bright blue and another that looked like a VW van from the 60’s. From there, the iMac has been my computer of choice, complementing them with iPods, Shuffles and iPhones whenever possible. For a really long time, these cool Apple computer gadgets have been part of my life. So it’s true when I say I don’t “know” Steve Jobs. But his life’s work is my constant companion. And I guess that’s why I feel a bit sad to know his personal operating system is not functioning at 100 percent.
So I along with many others hope for his speedy recovery. Get well soon Steve Jobs. The world is a much healthier place when you’re doing your job.
