Like everyone today, I’m mourning the passing of Steve Jobs, a man who possessed extraordinary passion and unlimited vision. A man who has been in my life as long as I can remember. He touched my life. He changed my life. He made my life beautiful.

Growing up professionally in San Francisco, I had the pleasure of living in an environment of constant innovation. But my favorite memory of those days was when a close writer friend of mine, Mark Friedman, was beside himself with excitement because of this new computer called the Macintosh. He was speaking a strange language, that of “cutting and pasting”, of “dragging and dropping.” Huge blocks of copy could be edited with one click with an odd device called a “mouse.” It was awkward at first, this “dragging and dropping.” But before long it was second nature.

And we were just the writers. Next came my art director friends and the miracles they could perform on their Macs. One friend, Dennis Ivan, could do amazing things in Photoshop that included shaving off a few inches to my girlish figure for a dating sight photo. And my friend, John Donaghue, who made a cat “wide-eyed” in amazement over the performance of a favorite brand of kitty litter. Look how far we’ve come from there!

When I met another friend, Stan, he prided himself on owning no Apple products. But within months, had completely Mac’ed out his architectural office with big screen monitors and hard drives that had enough memory to handle a lifetime of designs. Last count, he also owns several iPods, an iPad and a rainbow of tiny Shuffles.

Thanks to Steve Jobs, I have a connection with my teen-aged nephew, John, as we discuss our latest apps for our iPhones. He loves to impress me with how fast he can text on the touch screen without even looking!

And now, I’m working with the great team of Doug and Simon @ R3M1X3D in Orlando, in an office bathed in white, where each work station has a Mac monitor, the latest software and its own iPod. And our favorite conversation? Always, what’s next? The iPhone 5? A new iPad? A green iCar?

It’s sad to think Steve isn’t sitting at the drawing board figuring it out. But something tells me he already has. He’s left a whole generation of creators who have learned that it’s all about the dream. And you never stop striving for whatever is part of that dream.

Thank you, Steve Jobs, for touching my life. May you rest in peace.