Four years ago, at about this time of
year, I bought a new MacBook laptop. The economy was crumbling, people were
talking about an upcoming Depression with unemployment of more than 20 percent,
and I had no way of knowing, at the time, whether I’d bring in a single dollar
in income in 2009.
But
I bought the laptop anyway because it was time, and because I considered it a
business necessity. In late 2004, the laptop I’d bought at the end of 1998 went
kaflooey, taking half my business with it. After a couple of days of tense
waiting (plus a not inconsiderable expense), a computer guru was able to retrieve
most of it. From then on, I’ve made a point of upgrading every four years.
And
so it was that last Friday found me at the Apple Store at Valley Fair in San
Jose, purchasing a new MacBook Air. It’s not set up yet, but once it is, by the
end of December, it should see me through the Obama presidency.
More Space Than You’d Ever Need
My
first laptop was a Macintosh PowerBook, bought at the end of 1993. My
consulting business was in its infancy, cash flow was tight, and it was unclear
if I would succeed. But I bought the laptop anyway because I could see the
value of it for my business and because I’ve always believed you have to spend
money to make money.
That
first PowerBook had a black and white screen, would have gagged if you’d tried
to run a movie on it, never got connected to the Internet, and had 64MB of hard
drive. I couldn’t imagine using all that space, and I never did. But I did do a
lot of the revisions to my mystery, The McHenry Inheritance, on it, and it’s still in the garage.
Being
equipped for business hasn’t yet turned out to be a losing proposition for me.
After buying the PowerBook in late 1993, I had a breakout year in 1994. Despite
the fears over the economy at the end of 2008, the year 2009 turned out to be
all right — not great, but far better than I had feared. Experience has shown
that getting what you need for the job, even if you have to bet on unknown
revenues to pay for it, is a wise move.
The Dread Before the Setup
Working
out of my house for the past four years, I’ve become even more dependent than
before on my laptop. If the power goes out, I take it to Starbucks to check my
email and get some work done. If we have people working at the house for the
day, I take it to one of the shared office spaces in Santa Cruz and work from
there.
Right
now, I’m waiting until I can figure out where to get the best deal on Microsoft
Office, without which I can’t function. In years past, I would have set aside a
weekend to get the computer set up (there was always a maddening glitch that
took hours to sort out), and I had to be fairly certain I wouldn’t need the new
or old one for work during that time.
Now
I have the luxury of an in-house computer guru, my 22-year-old son, Nick. At a
mutually convenient time, I’ll hand him the old and new laptops, leave him
alone for a couple of hours, and everything should be good to go after that.
Technology is a beautiful thing when you have someone around who understands it.
