It’s a testament to Steve Jobs’ famous “reality distortion field” that I did not get to finish his biography on my Kindle. Admittedly, it was a blasphemous deed from the very start, but it was Jobs’ decision that Apple would not come up with a proper electronic-ink e-book reader. He probably wasn’t much of a reader himself, if he thought that you can read books on an LCD screen. Amazon’s Kindle was yet another technological revolution that he failed to acknowledge, caught as he was squeezing reality into his narrow field of view:

“It doesn’t matter how good or bad the product is”, he said upon the launch of the first Kindle, “the fact is that people don’t read anymore.”

Now, isn’t that ironic? The nearly 600 pages biography of the man who pronounced reading dead has been the number one best seller in its first week of publication and, one month later, is one of the best selling titles of the year.

I myself got hooked on Walter Isaacson’s captivating story from the very first pages (or should I say “Kindle screens”?). I lost a good number of hours of sleep during the last couple of weeks, immersed in the agony and ecstasy of this modern Renaissance man. When school break finally came, Isaacson’s book kept me company on a few flights and, as I was approaching its end, I felt the same sorrow as you would feel when parting with an old friend.

I did not make plans for yesterday evening mainly because I wanted to enjoy the last hundred Kindle screens (or should I say pages?) by myself. But when I left for my solitary dinner, I realized in horror that I could no longer find my Kindle. I must have have lost it somewhere between the airplane cabin and my hotel room. The really strange thing is that I have never misplaced my Kindle in two years since our love story began and yet I had already almost lost it only a day ago. Fortunately, the organizers of the event where I had mistakenly left it found it and returned in due time before my departure. But this second time, I seem to have lost it for good.

After an unsuccessful attempt at tracking its whereabouts, I grabbed my MacBook Air and headed for dinner. I ended up in a beautiful open-air terrace, facing an old square of this charming little French coastal city, and, as I was about to enjoy a proper Italian espresso, I opened the Kindle application and started reading. By the end of the book, I didn’t mind in the least about the shortcomings of reading on an LCD screen.

Said Jobs:

What drove me? I think most creative people want to express appreciation for being able to take advantage of the work that’s been done by others before us. I didn’t invent the language or mathematics I use. I make little of my own food, none of my own clothes.

Everything I do depends on other members of our species and the shoulders that we stand on. And a lot of us want to contribute something back to our species and to add something to the flow. It’s about trying to express something in the only way that most of us know how—because we can’t write Bob Dylan songs or Tom Stoppard plays.

We try to use the talents we do have to express our deep feelings, to show our appreciation of all the contributions that came before us, and to add something to that flow. That’s what has driven me.

As I was reading this farewell message from him, with (I hate to admit it) tears in my eyes, a few rain drops landed on the screen. I closed my MacBook Air and marveled once more at the beautiful object that is but a small part of Jobs’ legacy. The rain stopped almost instantly.

You would be mistaken to think that I did not see a number of signs in this strange sequence of events: the loss of my Kindle, the mysterious rain. Instead, you would be right to assume that by then Jobs’ powerful “reality distortion field” had completely subdued me.