Dear Steve
I remember my first Mac, Macintosh as you called it then. A beige magic box that hummed in the corner of 5th class. The only incursion of plastic in the wooden desks and crosses world of an Irish convent primary school, apart from the ‘Jem and the Holograms’ lunchboxes.
I learned how to draw with a turtle who had a pen on that computer. Those old enough will recognise logo. The rest of you are still wondering who ‘Jem and the Holograms’ are. Philistines. Anyway, it was my first and you always remember your first or at least, drawing a PENUP PENDOWN snowman on your first.
Next came my Tangerine iMac, followed by Bondi Blue, both with the hockey puck mouse. In college, they were with me at 4 o’clock in the morning through the still unfinished essay, splattered with coffee and occasional drool. Even my face plant into the keyboard for a wee snooze didn’t produce the dreaded sad mac. Just an analysis of Japanese foreign policy in the 1870s interrupted by kgadfgkj.jhgsrtgjvbl\tdhmdgbjakgjrakgnjgnjksdnnktghglhjjkugygyjghnj;fdf
fjggkgk.gfgfjhvhmb and a qwerty impression on my forehead that remained until lunchtime the next day.
They were with me during my masters. I bootlegged my first copy of photoshop on a Mac and I got my first job with a portfolio produced on them. And on my first day, lo and behold, what was waiting for me? An iBook. I wrote my first ads on it and won my first awards. I received thousands of emails, including an excellent financial opportunity from a Nigerian prince which I considered taking and an offer of a penis enlargement which I didn’t.
Then I was at a party and everything changed. No, I didn’t get drunk and end up in a corner with an ugly PC. A friend, recently arrived back from San Francisco, held up a little white oblong and said ‘This holds 400 CDs’. It was ‘2001. A Space Odyssey’ in 2001, the only difference was that the monolith was white and we wore clothes.
It wasn’t long before I joined the white headphone brigade. My iPod helped me survive my first Dublin to Wexford cycle and numerous ryanair flights with a crying baby on one side and a snoring businessman on the other.
Of course, no one could get me on the phone. How could I hear the nokia ring when my headphones were always in, the music blaring. The arrival of the iPhone saved my social life, such as it is. I saw the first picture of my niece, moments after she was born, on an iPhone. Stalked my first old boyfriend on facebook. And texts, oddles of them. Including one offering me another job. Here. And what do you think awaited me on my first day? A MacBook Pro.
From the Macintosh to the iPad, I have bought one of all your beautifully designed products. They are more than the packaging and marketing. Your firsts in technology have been part of many firsts for me. They were my paper and pen, my parchment and quill when I decided to write a historical romance for the money. Thankfully, I gave up after I used the word ‘throbbing’ seven times in one paragraph. As I said, it was for the money. So, perhaps it is fitting that I end with this quote.
“Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful … that’s what matters to me.”
Thank you Steve. Rest in peace.
Written on my MacBookPro.
