Reading | Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs | Walter Isaacson

Edwin Land, Polaroid inventor

Bob Dylan, songwriter

Walt Disney, storyteller

George Orwell, author

Timothy Leary, advocate of psychedelic drugs

No list of 20th century geniuses is complete without the incomparable Steve Jobs. From his early days growing up under the watchful eyes of his doting parents, his barefoot and body-odor years working in an apple orchard and studying Buddhism, building the first Apple computers in his parents' garage (yes, he really did) to his roller-coaster ride in building and sustaining his place at the center of tech revolution, Jobs' life is documented honestly, compassionately, exhaustively in this biography. Isaacson thoughtfully spins out the dualism of Jobs' both tender-hearted and ruthlessly critical personality. The author also informs readers that Jobs loved to have critical conversations while walking around his Cupertino neighborhood, ate at cheap vegetarian restaurants, and obsessed over mind-blowingly minute details in every product he ever launched. 

What Steve Jobs wanted, far more than money or fame, was to create a gloriously elegant product. His designs were intuitive, minimalist, serene. In order to maximize customer experience, he insisted upon end-to-end control over his devices; every moment from opening the box to adding apps to transferring data between devices flowed as effortlessly and pleasingly as possible. And please, no on or off switches; Jobs' devices simply fell asleep and woke back up at the user's touch. 

Sadly, Steve Jobs' life was cut down by pancreatic cancer but not before his name was added to any worthwhile list of 20th century geniuses. 

Steve Jobs, social revolutionary

(Now go read the book, and find out how Land, Dylan, Disney, Orwell, and Leary all played significant roles as heroes in Jobs' life.) 

* * * * * 

One way to remember who you are is to remember who your heroes are.

What a joy it was to have been alive as Steve Jobs was building Apple. I remember every product launch, each surge and countersurge in the technological throw down with arch nemesis Microsoft, every refinement of Jobs' ever-evolving hair styles. His light shown bright during my young adulthood, and I saw him as a rough and ready tech cowboy who was always up to something exciting and new. 

The way we're running the company, the product design, the advertising, it all comes down to this. Let's make it simple. Really simple. 

But there was always a hint of tarnish on Jobs' shiny Silicon Valley sheriff's badge. Reports out of Cupertino were that Jobs had a mean streak, a red hot temper, a sharp tongue. Prone to tantrums. Outrageously demanding. And nowhere near deserving of the pedestal upon which I had placed him. 

Several years after his death, I still carried ambiguous thoughts about the man. Hero or villain? I could never be sure.

But then, one day, a friend of mine told me this story.

Otherwise, as Dylan says, if you're not busy being born, you're busy dying.

She was visiting her parents who lived in the Bay area, and her infant was struggling to nap. So mom settled the poor fussy lamb into a stroller, and headed out the door, hoping that the fresh air, California sunshine, and rhythm of the rolling wheels would settle them both. 

As she walked along the neighborhood streets, she saw up ahead on the sidewalk, heading her way, a dad and his four- or five-year-old daughter, who was clearly learning to ride, in wobbly fashion, her two-wheel bicycle. My friend realized that one party would have to yield the sidewalk to the other, and with a frustrated sigh, recognized that the simplest solution would be for her to tilt the stroller down to the curb and pray that her baby would not be rattled awake. 

But before my friend could angle the stroller off the sidewalk, the man also sized up the situation and quickly, calmly, helped his budding cyclist ease down the curb into the street. In no time at all, they zipped past my friend and her still-sleeping babe. As they passed, the father looked at my friend, met her eyes, and smiled, wordlessly acknowledging that he understood all about crying babies who need to be walked with as little jostling as possible. And then, in a flash, he was gone. 

Only much later did my friend recognize this father. It was Steve Jobs. 

And ever since the day I heard that story, I have forgiven him his faults.