Dear Mister Rogers

Dear Mister. Rogers,

Forgive me for the delay. I’m the one who dropped the ball. I never responded to your letter. 

Mom and I read it, tucked it carefully back in the envelope, and saved it. We thought one message from you was more than any six-year-old could expect.

But I want you to know, I never stopped watching. 

Even at 16, when I was 25 lbs too heavy for 1988, I’d turn on PBS and cry a little when you sang that you loved me just the way I was. The older I got, the harder that was for me to believe.

Honestly, the older I got, the harder everything about you was for me to believe.

In your world, old friends existed. In your world, neighbors treated one another with welcome.  

(Knock, knock, knock.) 

“Oh, hello! You were just in the neighborhood? Well, come on in. I’m so glad to see you. Stay and talk a while.”

A neighborhood steady as a sleeping heartbeat.

That pulse played in the background while I was surviving a feral public high school, stepping over bloody hallway fights, fingernails and teeth, heads pounded into lockers. I kept moving, staring down stone-eyed hate with defiant apathy. “I don’t care. Don’t care. Don’t care about anything. Caring is what makes them come after you.”

I’d throw myself on the couch when a day was over and flip on the screen. Nothing had changed for you. You asked me if I wanted to feed the fish. Of course I did. 

“Not too much. Just a sprinkle.” 

Your world was a fairy tale. I don’t mean Make Believe, I mean the little house on the street where grown ups exchanged civilities as if there were no need to be afraid of one another.

You showed me that when people are somehow different, we should ask good questions. Then we should listen slowly.

You showed me how being curious and being a know-it-all were polar opposites. 

You never once tried to hide what you didn’t know. 

You delighted in expertise in others. You chased after honoring them by letting their hard work and deep study matter.

You were glad the world was full of people who were stronger than you in some ways. This never once threatened you.

You helped me hold my emotions at arm’s length to get a good look at them.

“Sometimes you feel angry? Sometimes you feel scared. That’s okay. We all do. Your feelings matter to me. Now what? What do we do with all this you feel?”

I was angry today, Mister Rogers. 

I was so angry with what’s happening in the world. I was King Friday, roaring, and puffing, and stomping—trying to make some sort of proclamation that would bring order to everything. 

I was angry because I’m tired, and scared, and disappointed in people I used to trust.

Things are pretty bad, Mister Rogers. 

It’s not just that one bad thing has happened so much as that one bad thing has happened in the middle of so many other bad things, and now the whole world feels like chaos. 

Nobody is curious. Everybody is a know-it-all. Nobody is listening.

People are shouting and afraid. The news, the computers, the televisions are all so loud.

I’m trying to remember what you said to do in times like this. You said there would be helpers. You told us to look for the helpers, but it’s hard to know where to look for them because it’s different this time. 

This time, it’s not like a building is burning and a few people run in to rescue the trapped. This time, everything is on fire. And everyone is shooting. And everyone is ducking for cover. 

There are so many lies, and there’s so much bragging, and there is so much yelling. People are hardly human any more, Mister Rogers. 

I wish you would push a magic button and summon a trolley to carry me away. I want to land in a place where I can sit quietly and watch you and an old friend have a polite conversation.

I wish you could remind us all what it means to retain the best part of childlikeness—but most of all, what it means to be adults. There are so few adults left these days, Mister Rogers.

But maybe, part of your point was leaving this ache. Maybe that’s what you meant for us to keep all along.

Maybe yours was a discipleship of longing. 

“Children, look at community with me. Look how beautiful it can be to honor and welcome one another. Once you see the wonder of mutual respect, you will never be satisfied with anything less. 

“Watch a grown man walk in curiosity, and patience, and restraint. See what it looks like to explore instead of chest-beat, and roar, and ravage.

”Watch faith, trust, and hope move inside a person. Watch me focus while the shrapnel flies. I will lead. You follow.

”Kneel, child. I dub thee a Votary of the Cardigan and Sneakers.”

There it is, Mister Rogers.  That was the point all along, wasn’t it? That was the commission.

Steady. Humane. Tis the gift to be simple, tis the gift to be free.

Thank you, dear soul—dear saint. I’d nearly forgotten.

Rebecca Reynolds