Won't You Be My Neighbor?

I have to comment on this story.


Apparently, some students from the Tulane University Law School had a party at a children's museum in New Orleans. One exhibit at the museum is dedicated to Mr. Rogers, and featured a pair of the famous sneakers that he tied at the beginning of every show. Someone from the law school attending the party smashed the plexiglass case and stole one of the sneakers. After an appeal from the dean of the school, the sneaker was returned; it was found tied to a pipe under a sink in the women's room.


Who would do something like that to Mr. Rogers?


This kind of thing happened once before, when Mr. Rogers was still alive. He drove an old Chevy Impala for years, and one day, it was stolen from its spot on the street near the TV station where he was filming. The story of the theft got out, and was all over the news. Two days later, the car was parked in the exact spot where it was stolen, with a note: "If we'd known it was yours, we never would have taken it."


That's more like it.


I have to admit, I was never a Mr. Rogers fan when I was a kid. I don't know why -- I just never connected with him. But then, after Isabel and I were married but before we had kids, we heard an interview with him on the radio. He was discussing a book of letters that people had written to him. (He was a great letter writer, and kept up corresponence with some people for years, even if he'd never met them.) One story he told during the interview just killed me: it was from the mother of a small girl who was being treated for cancer. The girl needed frequent scans to check on her progress, and hated being trapped in the scanning tube, where she needed to keep still. (I know now just was she was going through.) For a little kid, even just two minutes of keeping still seemed like an eternity. But her mom figured out that it took two minutes to sing the theme song to Mr. Roger's Neighborhood, and so mom would get on the microphone that the technician uses to give instructions to the patient, and she and her daughter would sing the song together. When it was done, the little girl's scan was done.


And then, of course, I had my own kids, and I became a bigger fan. Peter was a Mr. Rogers fan. He liked that Mr. Rogers talked to him.


And then I'd watch more, and I'd see him do stuff like this. He's just so cool.


And those sweaters he wore? His own mother knitted every one of them.


How could you not love this guy?


I'm kind of sorry I waited so long to enjoy him. He's really easy to make fun of, but we need more people like him.