Thank you Steve

"Thank you Steve" has been trending all day.

Here is my thanks.

Thank you Steve for being such a visionary.
You believed in technology and its ability
and you also believed in something of even greater importance:
you believed in the contributions that only you could give
in unlocking technology's potential.

It doesn't take a genius to measure what you've done,
but anyone who was a child of the 80's or before
has a better grasp of what life would be like without you.

For example, if it were not for what you started Steve,
I wouldn't have found out about your death for another few days.
The blog post that I read this morning announcing you were gone
probably would not have been there without you.

Without Twitter,
I would not have the slightest idea about
the Westboro Baptist church
who plans to picket at your funeral.
I guess they are a bunch of whackos.
At least that is what all of America is saying.
They also think that you should be greatly flattered
that they are giving you so much attention.
Negative attention via their i-phones.
The shame.
I think you probably think that is rather funny.

Without facebook,
I would not have known that you were so ill
that you stepped down
from your position at Apple
weeks ago.

The Angry Bird references this past weekend
at our church's worldwide conference
would have left my church members with one less laugh.
Yes, you had your part there too Steve.

The games that my 2 year old begs to play on her dad's phone
would probably also be null and void,
as well as her ability to navigate the touch screen.

The i-tunes card that my daughter won
for her entry into The U.S. Constitution art contest
would not be the coolest prize in the world,
even though it sits in her room
awaiting Santa to bring her that ITouch she really
really really really wants for Christmas.

Most important to me Steve are the memories.
I can envision as plain as yesterday
the times when as a young girl
I would sit at my dad's McIntosh
in total awe.
Could something really be this cool and easy?
And we had one in our house?

It was a 2.1 or something like that. I really have no idea what it was,
but it was a dinosaur and all we did on it was word process and play tetris.
It had a floppy drive that was pretty fancy.
I had no idea what the disks actually did, but I liked to put them in
and click the button of the newly invented mouse to make the diskette come back out.

You see, my dad had eagerly learned
the new technology at his office in downtown SanDiego
and brought his training home to his seven children.
He created us each a folder with our name
and would be so frustrated when he would find saved documents everywhere but our folders.
Personally, I think he liked feeling like the hero when we were repeatedly relieved
that he was able to find everything we saved in no man's land.

Without you Steve, at this very moment,
I would not be sitting at my PC
writing about you for the world to see
at their leisure.

Because I would be stuck writing a letter
by hand to my local newspaper.
Or I would just keep all my sadness to myself.

Steve Jobs, you changed the way we live our lives.
As a nation and a world,
because of you,
we are more connected, informed, and intelligent.
What more can I say than that?
You changed the world my friend.
You changed every person in the world.
Not very many people can say that.
It must be so awesome to gain a new perspective
and sit up in heaven to see how it all played out.

After I go on google and find one of your best quotes,
paste it into a google image via google picasa,
I will then
publish this post,
and finish it off by
linking it up on my twitter and facebook.
The world will read it.

And I will be sit at home
playing tetris for the next hour.
And then our family will watch every Pixar video.
In your honor Steve.
Rest in peace my favorite online friend.


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