Here’s to the crazy ones.

In 1976, the year before I was born, Steve Jobs co-founded Apple Computer.

My mom purchased a Macintosh Plus computer in 1986. In 1991, mom bought a Quadra and I got the Plus.  The Plus saw me through high school and my freshman year of college, when mom got a Performa and I received the Quadra.

Because of my knowledge of Macs, in 1995 I got a college job in the Mac lab.

Because of that job, in 1996 I became a Computer Science major.

Because of my CS major, in 1998 I got a summer internship in Silicon Valley.

Because of that internship, in 1998 I started dating a guy named Peter, who worked at Apple.

Because of dating Peter, in 1999 I got my motorcycle license.

Because of my Apple connections, in 2000 I became employee #17 at a small start-up called Danger Research.

Because of, well, my life up to that point, in 2009 I became an Apple employee.

On June 6, 2011, in what would be his final presentation, Steve Jobs demoed iCloud at the Worldwide Developers Conference.

This incredibly terrible screen capture is of one of my proudest professional moments: Steve on stage at WWDC, talking about the iOS 5 Setup Assistant, which was one of my projects.

We launch iCloud in 7 days and I hope it would have made Steve proud.

If he hadn’t founded that little company 35 years ago, in all likelihood I wouldn’t be living in the Bay Area, wouldn’t be riding motorcycles, wouldn’t have met or married my amazing husband, wouldn’t have spent my whole career with truly inspiring and brilliant and wonderful people.  The entire fabric of my life has formed the way it has because of Apple.

Thank you, Steve.  God bless.