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I didn’t grow up watching “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood,” but then again, its inception was in 1968, a year after I graduated from high school; (so the likelihood that I would have devoted much time to the program was almost nil).
In the last few moments, I did a Google search, and discovered that the television show aired for a grand total of (drum roll) 33 years, and only went off the air in 2001; a fateful year for this country, and two years before his passing.
It occurs to me that “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood” was on television for the same amount of time that Jesus lived, and moved and breathed on the earth. I have never heard anyone expound on this bit of information. Perhaps it’s just a coincidence. But then, I don’t believe in coincidences.
Oh, I remember seeing snippets of Fred Rogers’ program, and honestly, it did little or nothing for me at the time. Obviously, the show was geared towards little children; the humor, the skits, the puppets, the guests. And “Bro. Fred’s” voice and mannerisms always struck me as a bit effeminate.
Speaking of the foregoing prefix before his name, many people were unaware that Mr. Rogers was actually Rev. Rogers. For you see, Fred was an ordained Presbyterian minister, and to my knowledge, he possessed a calling unlike any other; before or since. Interestingly enough, he had been specially commissioned by his church to host “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood” for the little boys and girls of America.
I have written about Mr. Rogers in the past, having previously read a poignant story of which he was the subject. And come to think about it, I only have “given him the time of day” the past couple of years; (a full decade and a half after his death).
Pt. 2
As I have inferred, I love a particular story I read about Mr. Rogers. I am including that story here.
Anthony Breznican, a senior writer at Entertainment Weekly once experienced a lifetime encounter with Fred Rogers that will restore your faith in humanity. Breznican, like Rogers, hails from Pittsburgh. And like most of us, he grew up watching Mr. Rogers. And then he outgrew him. Until he needed his kindness again, when he was in college.
“As I got older, I lost touch with the show, (which ran until 2001). But one day in college, I rediscovered it. I was having a hard time. The future seemed dark. I was struggling. Lonely. Dealing with a lot of broken pieces, and not adjusting well. I went to Pitt and devoted everything I had to a school paper; hoping it would propel me into some kind of worthwhile future.
It was easy to feel hopeless. During one season of my life it was especially bad. Walking out of my dorm, I heard familiar music.
‘Won’t you be my neighbor?’
The TV was playing in the common room. Mr. Rogers was asking me what I do with the mad I feel. I had lots of ‘mad’ stored up. Still do. It feels so silly to say, but I stood mesmerized. His program felt like a cool hand on my head. I left feeling better.”
Then, days later something amazing happened. Breznican went to step into an elevator. The doors opened, and he found himself looking into the face of Mr. Rogers. Breznican kept it together at first. The two just nodded at each other. But when Mr. Rogers began to walk away, he couldn’t miss the opportunity to say something.
“The doors open. He lets me go out first. I step out, but turn around.
‘Mr. Rogers, I don’t mean to bother you. But I just want to say, Thanks.’
He smiles, but this probably happens to him every ten feet all day long.
‘Did you grow up as one of my neighbors?’
I felt like crying.
‘Yeah. I did.’
With this, Mr. Rogers opened his arms, lifting his satchel, for a hug.
‘It’s good to see you again, neighbor.’
I got to hug Mr. Rogers! This is about the time we both began crying.”
But this story is about to get even better.
“We chatted a few minutes. Then Mr. Rogers started to walk away. After he had taken a couple of steps, I said in a kind of rambling rush that I’d stumbled on the show recently when I really needed it. So, I said, ‘Thanks’ for that. Mr. Rogers paused, and motioned towards the window, and sat down on the ledge.
This is what set Mr. Rogers apart. No one else would have done this. He says,
“Do you want to tell me what is upsetting you?”
So, I sat down. I told him my grandfather had just died. He was one of the good things I had. I felt lost. Brokenhearted. I like to think I didn’t go on and on, but pretty soon he was talking to me about his granddad, and a boat the old man had given to him as a kid.
Mr. Rogers asked how long ago my Pap had died. It had been a couple of months. His grandfather was obviously gone for decades. He still wished the old man was here, and wished he still had the boat.
‘You never really stop missing the people you love,’ Mr. Rogers said.
That boat had been a gift from his grandfather for something. Maybe good grades; something important. Rogers didn’t have the boat anymore, but he had given him his ethic for work.
‘Things, really important things that people leave with us are with us always.’
By this time, I’m sure my eyes looked like stewed tomatoes. Finally, I said, ‘thank you,’ and I apologized if I had made him late for an appointment.
‘Sometimes you’re right where you need to be,’ he said.
Mr. Rogers was there for me. So, here’s my story on the 50th anniversary of his program for anyone who needs him now. I never saw him again. But that quote about people who are there for you when you’re scared? That’s authentic. That’s who he was. For real.”
Mr. Rogers died in 2003. When Breznican heard the news, he sat down at his computer, and cried. Not over the loss of a celebrity, but a neighbor.
Thank you for being one of those helpers, Mr. Rogers. We hope that somewhere, you’re in a boat with your grandpa again.
(Allison Carter, USA Today)
Pt. 3
There is a new movie out with Tom Hanks called, “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood.” And since I had previously written about Mister Rogers, (a blog that is not included here) I had more than a passing interest in seeing the movie.
Admittedly, I feel a little guilty going to a movie alone these days, as my wife is staying with our grandson, while our daughter is spending a month in Nepal, (yes, Nepal) engaged in doing social work with an NGO there. (But, admittedly, the guilt wasn’t potent enough to preclude me from following through with my plan last night).
Well, so I got dressed, and drove the ten or twelve minutes which separated me from the local theater in time for the first Friday evening premier showing. However, when I arrived, I discovered that the parking lot was full to overflowing, and I surmised that I didn’t want any part of sitting “bunched up” against a person on my left and one on my right, and a theater packed out like sardines in a can. As a result, I had no sooner drove into the “asphalt jungle” that I turned around and drove out of it.
Having arrived home, and put on my jogging shorts and muscle shirt, I debated whether I would “take in” the 10:30pm showing of the movie. I was tired, and I knew my ambition would, no doubt, progressively wane in the two hours which separated me from the process of redressing, getting in the car, and heading back to the theater.
However, as a counselor I tell my clients that there’s a great substitute for ambition, since ambition is little more than an emotion. The substitute? A decision. After all, anything good must be done “on purpose.” Only wrecks happen by accident. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist that little teaching).
Pt. 4
Thus, I made a premeditated decision to take in the late movie. I realized that the theater would be “blown out” on Saturday, and I would find myself in exactly “the same boat” as I experienced the first time that I drove up to the theater.
Throwing my street clothes back on, I walked out the door at 9:55pm, and retraced my route of two hours earlier. Ten minutes later I drove into… an almost empty parking lot, and, as you might expect, I wasn’t complaining.
Exiting the car, I walked the twenty yards which separated me from my quest; the box office window. And as I stepped up to the young lady in the booth, and she looked expectantly at me, waiting for me to announce the movie of my choice, I almost involuntarily began to sing.
(Yeah, I did).
“It’s a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood…”
And then, the slightest bit self-conscious, I mused,
“I bet lots of folks have walked up to you tonight singing that song.”
To which “Anna” replied,
“Ummm. Nope, you’re the first one!”
(Now, I really did feel like a fool. LOL).
Having purchased my ticket, I walked through the front door and into the lobby, had my ticket punched by the attendant, walked to the candy counter, asked for a senior popcorn and coke, paid for my goodies, and proceeded to theater number three; down the hallway, second door on the right.
Pt. 5
Walking into the theater, I found it to be very dark, very quiet, and …very empty.
As a matter of fact, I was the only human being in the whole place! And, as I always do, I climbed the steps of the amphitheater to the top, walked to the middle of the row of seats, and plopped down, dead center; setting my drink in the right holder, and my wallet, and cell phone in the left one. (I am one of those guys who doesn’t like to carry stuff in my pockets. Even when I go to a restaurant, I immediately set the obtrusive items on the table).
Be that as it may, I sat “all by my lonely” on the top row of the theater, as the commercials for upcoming movies ran for 15 plus minutes. However, finally, finally the opening credits of “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” flickered onto the screen.
And as you might imagine, the first scene had a fairly believable Tom Hanks, portraying Mr. Rogers, walking through the door of his “play room,” opening a nearby closet, exchanging his suit coat for a red sweater, and taking off his street shoes, and replacing them with sneakers.
To be fair, I thought the well-known actor’s attempt to replicate Mr. Rogers’ voice was slightly contrived, (but perhaps only slightly). At the same time, he looked enough like “the real McCoy” for this audience of one to settle in, and absorb the plot and implications of the movie.
And without absolutely spoiling it for you, suffice it to say that the plot centered around a fella named Tom Junod, (though he assumes a different name in the film), an Esquire magazine journalist, and his relationship with Mr. Rogers; (which all began when the former contacted the latter for an interview).
Ultimately, this interview was titled, “Can You Say…Hero?” and became the feature story for the November 1998 issue of Esquire magazine, and featured (there’s that word again) the beaming image of Mr. Rogers on the cover.
Pt. 6
And again, without giving away anything, Mr. Rogers made a profound difference in Tom Junod’s life, and for that matter, the life of his entire family. He made a difference in many lives that God set in his pathway.
There was an exchange in the movie in which our “hero” is speaking on the phone with the foregoing journalist, and he says,
“Do you know who the most important person in my life is, Tom?”
And perhaps Junod merely responded with, “Who?”
And with a twinkle in his eye, and a slight catch in his characteristic voice, Mr. Rogers replies,
“Well, at this very moment, Tom, you are the most important person in my life!”
I think that’s how he made you feel. Yes, I think that’s how he made you feel. As if for that moment in time, you were the only person who really mattered to him.
I felt very much this way when I paraphrased the Book of Philippians; (years before I paraphrased the entire New Testament). It was as if I was given the wherewithal to walk into Paul’s Roman cell, and sit down beside him, and talk with him about his life, and impact and suffering, to know him as my friend and brother, and to realize his compassion and joy in spite of the circumstances which surrounded him.
Following is a poignant reminiscence from an article about Mr. Rogers.
“Every morning, when he swims, he steps on a scale in his bathing suit and his bathing cap and his goggles, and the scale tells him he weighs 143 pounds. This has happened so many times that Mister Rogers has come to see that number as a gift, as a destiny fulfilled, because, as he says,
‘the number 143 means I love you. It takes one letter to say I, and four letters to say love, and three letters to say you. One hundred and forty-three. I love you. Isn't that wonderful?’”
Pt. 7
And now, the movie finally drew to a close, and I hesitated to leave. After stuffing my wallet and cell phone back into my pockets, I ambled down the long flight of steps, and paused to see if any actual footage of the “real” Mister Rogers would appear on the screen. And, in fact, it did.
There he was standing in his element, in his little “play room” with his puppets, and lighting up his little world with that memorable smile.
Now, I walked down the long hallway which led out of the very dark, very quiet and… very empty theater. And as I walked out the door, and into the lobby of the place, I could still hear the closing song as it trailed off behind me.
It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood
A beautiful day for a neighbor
Could you be mine?
Would you be mine?
Let's make the most of this beautiful day
Since we're together, might as well say
Would you be my, could you be my
Won't you be my neighbor?
A lone security guard greeted me, as I neared the exit of the building. The lights were turned down low. No one was behind the candy counter, and the ushers were, by now, heating up their TV dinners, or turning in for the night.
And now, I pushed open the exit door, and stepped out into the street. And a penetrating moment of sadness suddenly overwhelmed me.
I can’t really account for why I experienced that fleeting emotion. Perhaps it had something to do with the poignancy of losing anyone so singular as this man happened to be, and who had impacted several generations of children.
Children who ultimately became fathers and mothers, and subsequently, grandfathers and grandmothers; while their own children and grandchildren continued to be entertained by the same humble little man; who to children presented as an adult, and who to adults seemed almost childlike.
So much like the journalist, I felt almost as if I had been granted my own personal interview with Mister Rogers. After all, I had been the only human being within fifty feet in any direction, and I experienced a strange sensation that this man had set aside a bit of his valuable time, as he did with countless other people during his lifetime… for me.
And perhaps during those few moments which he granted me, I was, indeed, the most important person in his life.
*Tom Hanks was recently informed that he and Mister Rogers are 6th cousins. No wonder they look alike.
By William McDonald, PhD
