So, yeah, the iPad came out, did you hear? Honestly, I couldn’t escape that omnipresent TV commercial featuring that band The Blue Van and those fake, weird legs. The weirdest thing about this launch, for me anyway, was that I wasn’t at it. I didn’t get in line, I didn’t pre-order, I didn’t even see one until Monday. I have yet to hold one, to play with it and see what it’s like.

This is bizarre because this is the first Apple category-defining product since the e-mate that I haven’t adopted early. Newton? Check. iMac? Bondi. iPod? 5GB. iPhone? #300 in line. AAPL in 1995 when it was at $14? I wish.

But something about this one struck me as different. Try as I might, I just could not fit it into my admittedly well-connected life. I tried to imagine the scenarios when an iPad would fit the bill: Nights when I don’t want to drag my MacBook Pro home but need a little more screen real estate than on my iPhone? I guess? Browsing things instead of committing to watching a movie? Possibly. Watching a movie? No thanks. Chat Roulette? No front-facing camera.

I know the iPad will be successful. I know it will be a game changer, that the apps at launch are hinting at potential and the apps and OS changes being written now will transform an honestly simple piece of technology into a true new way of understanding interaction with a computer. But this first one just – it doesn’t offer much more than that idea for me. So I skipped it.

And then I heard that my Uncle, pushing 65, had picked an iPad up on launch day. He had waited in line at his local Apple Store, and then heard that Best Buy had no line, so he popped over there. He surprised my cousin with it by joking that it was a gift for him. It wasn’t. He wanted it for itself.

Many will argue that this is far, far from a problem for Apple. Obviously there are far more of the middle-aged uncles out there than 30-something single-income NYC designers. Apple is moving towards the thick middle of the American bell curve, and by controlling the OS, the apps, and the ads, they will stand to make a bazillion dollars.

But. But. The pause in me arises from the fact that Apple has shifted, almost imperceptibly, from the Vanguard to the Old Guard. They have gone from being the cutting-edge, daring, (and yes, expensive) designer’s brand to the shop on King st. in Charleston that my Mom takes her iPhone in when she can’t make the icons stop wiggling. And in this shift, they have given up a little prestige, a little bit of the aspirational nature that has driven this success. They will continue to make amazingly great products. They will continue (as long as Steve or Jony Ive are around) to raise the bar for designed electronics the world over. But the cache they had is being cashed in, and once it’s spent, there’s no going back. Just ask Sony.

Back when Apple’s PC marketshare was hovering around 3%, Steve Jobs famously said that Apple wanted to be “the Porsche of computers”. Well, with the iPad, Apple has made its Cayenne. I hope they sell a boatload.