On a number of occasions, I have mentioned my "Steve Jobs story." I guess I'm feeling light on material these days and have become obsessive enough about Slope that I can't bear the thought of a Sunday passing without a new post, so I thought I'd share it today. I had thought at one point I'd save it for when the poor man finally goes to the great Apple Store in the sky, but when that sad day finally arrives, I think I'd rather share all my Jobs thoughts and stories, since he's meant a tremendous amount to me over the course of my life.
I'll save all the back-story for a later time, but suffice it to say that Steve Jobs had been my hero since 1982. I had followed him religiously since my early teenage years, and I read every article and book I could find about him. He was, to me, the truest of Americans – – – someone who had come from nowhere (an adopted child living in a middle-class suburb) and, in his eary 20s, had founded and was running one of the most amazing companies in the country.
The trouble was, I never got to see the guy. Even when I moved to the Silicon Valley, I bought my first place (at the age of 23) near Apple, and in a special homage to my hero worship, it was practically across the street from Homestead High where both Jobs and Steve Wozniak had attended and met. I also had started work at Apple (from which Jobs had been ejected two years prior). But the fact is that my friends kept seeing him all over the places – – in grocery stories, around town, and I – "his biggest fan" – never saw him even once.
I started to tell people that I was, in fact, Steve Jobs, sort of like the whole Clark Kent/Superman thing, because you never saw us both in the same place. Years passed, and although his Next company got a lot of press in 1989/1990, it never really went anywhere, and Jobs sort of disappeared from the media altogether.
By 1997, Prophet was five years old, and it was at that point just a little three-person outfit I was running out of my house (the other two folks worked out of their own homes). We were a financial history/daily updates shop, and we were very dependent on a satellite feed. The dish to that feed was – of all places – on top of my roof, and one of the tasks I had as the CEO was to climb on top of the roof any time the signal got weak and adjust the dish.
So I was doing just that one summer day, and I was dressed for the occasion. I was wearing a plain white t-shirt, some old blue-jean cut-offs (not hemmed, but tattered with fringes), and I had a compass dangling from a string around my neck, since I had to align the dish correctly. It occurred to me that I needed some extra ballast to keep the dish from moving, so I climbed down from my roof and drove to the local Ace Hardware.
As I was heading toward the entrance of this little hardware store, I noticed a Porsche unlike any I had seen before pulling up to the curb on the other side of the street. I was intrigued, since I had never seen this car in town, and out steps…….Steve Jobs! I have some quirky special skills, and one of them is really good face recognition. Even at a great distance, I could tell instantly this was the man. And right then and there, I decided that I was going to finally meet this guy. In a hardware store.
So I walked in the store, and started glancing down each of the aisles. It isn't a very big place, so it didn't take me long to find him looking at chains (why, I have no idea). Now, just to be clear, it wasn't an easy decision for me to say hello to the guy, because this is someone I had practically worshipped from afar for fifteen years, and I was really nervous. But I decided it was now or never, so I walked up to him.
"Mr. Jobs?"
He looks at me. I extend my hand. He shakes it.
"My name is Tim Knight, and I just wanted you to know that I've looked up to you since I was thirteen years old."
And he replies: "Uh-oh." And he moves along with the task at hand.
And you know something? I wasn't the least bit embarassed. In fact, I was proud of myself. Because even though I didn't mean a thing to this person – – and in my nasty outfit, he probably thought I was some kind of kook anyway – – I got up the courage to say hello and shake his hand. I had done it! I had finally met Steve Jobs in person!
But here's the funny part: now the spell was broken. I couldn't get rid of the guy. He kept showing up everywhere! I saw him at the grocery store. I saw him walking around town. I even came home one day and saw him and his wife rollerblading down my street. "Hey! Jobs! Get off my lawn!"
And even though he had done great things by the time I had met him, he wasn't 1/10th as famous as he is today, mainly because of Pixar and the iPod. But it's good to see your heroes are regular human beings. And it's good to take the moments in life where you need a little extra courage to do what you'll regret not doing if you fail to take action. And that's all I've got to say about Steven P. Jobs until I have occasion to say more.
