Goodbye Mister Rogers

I think it was the tie. Or that simple catchy tune. Or was it that zip-up cardigan sweater? Was it because he was a Presbyterian minister? I didn’t even know what a Presbyterian was.

I don’t know what compelled me to watch that television show as a child. Even in elementary school, when my classmates were watching “Saved by the Bell,” I managed to flip over to PBS at the top of the hour to watch the soft-spoken man that looked like a white version of my dad.

On Thursday, Feb. 27, 2003, stomach cancer claimed Mister Roger’s life.

I remember at the beginning of every episode, Mister Rogers, played by ordained Presbyterian minister Fred Rogers, would sing “Won’t You Be My Neighbor” as the camera panned across a miniature model of the “neighborhood.”

He would then walk in the front door of his dull house with the pale walls, greet the boys and girls and then exchange his coat and shoes for that powder-blue cardigan and those grandpa-style house shoes.

Ok, maybe the sweater was sometimes red or yellow, but I remember the blue one pretty well.

After donning his comfortable attire, Mister Rogers would invite the boys and girls into his home for 15 minutes, before the art show with that landscape painter and his pronounced afro hairstyle.

But during that short time in Mister Roger’s neighborhood, we got to ride the little model train into Make-Believe, where we met the puppets and found out what was going on in their world. I vaguely remember King Friday XIII. I don’t remember if I liked him or not because he seemed so dictator-ish.

Of course, there were the episodes when we didn’t go to Make-Believe but just went down the street to watch the neighborhood chef make a tomato/egg salad thing. Albeit it wasn’t among the heart-attack creations of Emeril Lagasse, but it was simple and kids could make it themselves (assuming that they knew how to use a knife properly).

Besides the tomato/egg thing, there was the one episode devoted to Mister Roger’s sprained ankle. Whether he had tripped on the sidewalk on that beautiful day in the neighborhood is unclear. But he did use that episode to teach the kiddies how to walk with a cane.

Mister Rogers sang songs and talked to us about loving ourselves and everyone else. He also told us obey our parents and to be friendly to our neighbors. After all, everyone in his neighborhood was friendly. Then again, everyone in his neighborhood was a puppet or way too cheerful to be human.

But it didn’t matter how unreal that perfect neighborhood was to a third-grader. All that mattered to me was at the end of my 15-minute visit to Mister Roger’s neighborhood, the tie and cardigan reminded me to call my dad at work to make sure he was going to pick my brother and me up to spend every other weekend with him.

I still don’t know what compelled me to watch that show, and I honestly don’t even remember most of the episodes, outside of the tomato/egg innovation and the sprained ankle. But I do remember that every day during my early school years, I’d turn on PBS to watch Mister Rogers. And I remember that I liked it.

After all, as the great philosopher named “Anonymous” said: “People will forget what you’ve said. People will forget what you’ve done. But they will never forget how you made them feel.”

Goodbye, Mister Rogers. I’m sure that God has a special place in Heaven just for you, among the other television ministers that were telling the truth all along.