Story takes place in the summer of 20XX. Cupertino, CA at the infamous 1IL. It was a week or so into our 3 week training(vacation) and we decided this was one of the days where all of us would make the trek from Bubb4(the genius training building) to 1IL for a Cafe Maccs trip.
Our Lunchtime apparently coincided with the entire corporate staff’s lunchtime, so getting a seat was like getting you hands on a Tickle Me Elmo on Black Friday, but there were less women in curlers and degenerates.
The group of about 5 of us(some came from another group) had been split up, but a majority of us found one of the longer tables after a large group happened to get up from their lunch. We swooped in and staked our claim.
It happened that there were two seats among us, adjacent to one another that we were holding for a couple stragglers waiting for their pasta dishes.
As we are all eating hurriedly(traffic to 1IL cut lunch in half) yet quietly(customary when the food is amazing, which Cafe Macc’s menu is), I make out of my peripheral vision someone standing with a tray.
I hear someone whisper/gasp ‘omigod’ and immediately after, its followed by ‘excuse me, may I sit here?’…I look up, and as if from a movie entrance in slow motion, there is Steve Jobs himself. Behind him are 4-5 people, looking utterly distraught that they are not getting to sit next to him(they appeared to be assistants), look around confused.
Someone, I don’t know who, was able to wheeze out the words ‘of….of course’. Steve had waited for an answer and acknowledgement from us ALL to take the seat. Once he sat down, he began shuffling his tray but then he did something that stunned me. He turned around in somewhat annoyance to the 4-5 gophers behind him and made the ‘go on, shoo!’ motion. They scattered. Steve turns back around with a little chuckle and begins his meal.
Steve would NOT speak whilst there was food in his mouth. Not a word. He would finish a mouthful, take a small drink of water and he made a couple remarks here and there.
‘Come into this cafeteria at the wrong time and you’ll never get to sit down and enjoy your meal. Thank you for the seat.’ among other small statements. All of which had us hyperventilating.
Steve had a VERY small meal, which he ate not with haste, but somewhat robotically and efficiently. His time at the table was less than 10 minutes. After he finished, he wiped his face with his napkin, wiped the table around him and stood up.
‘Everyone enjoy your food, don’t rush. It’s unhealthy. Have a nice day.’
There was a 30 second silence after he walked away, which was the dozen or so of us trying to collect what had just happened.
This was him. This was the leader. A mythical, often referred to as tyrannical(by some corporate employees) leader that RAN. THE. COMPANY. had just sat and conversed with us.
If you have never worked for Apple, I don’t expect you to understand what this means. This is an Apple nerd’s equivalent of going to rock camp and meeting Eric Clapton or Angus Young. This was El Hefe and he talked TO us.
This was the leader of Apple. The visionary. The person who’s ideas created the products that we fell in love with, which spawned our desire to work for Apple. In a sense, he was why we were there. It was dream-like, to say the least.
The man had a kind and gentle demeanor, but most of all, polite and grounded. Far-gone from the horror stories that seem all-too-frequented on tech blogs. I saw it with my own eyes. It changed me.
No Steve Jobs at Apple means that some of the magic will go with it. He was our Walt Disney. He was our Patton. He was our William Wallace(ok that’s a stretch but you get the point).
One thing is for sure, the keynotes will never be the same and watching Phil Schiller on stage in head to toe denim is definitely going to take the wind out of some people’s sails.
Apologies for any hastily typed sentences or grammatical errors. This was typed on my iPhone.
I’d like to post this from my personal blog, but that time has not come yet. Soon.
Here’s to the crazy ones.
-GBT/ASP
