My Childhood Rediscovered

"Just a beautiful day in this neighborhood, a beautiful day for a neighbor, would you be mine? Would you be mind? Won't you be my neighbor?" -Fred Rogers, Mister Rogers Neighborhood. Tom Junod's profile piece on the Definitive Mister Rogers was truly an extra-ordinary piece. Lets say that I love it! The diction used in this piece revealed to me "every situation and its emotional coloration" as Janet Burroway would say it. Junod made me identify with him and Mister Rogers as well as his attitude while writing this piece. The feel of this writing was so real and hit really close to home. The beginning of the piece gave us a little background on our narrator, Tom Junod, and his story. I feel as if this allowed us into his head a little. It allowed me to really focus on his attachment to Old Rabbit and the imagery he used to describe it was extremely descriptive. "The filthy, precious strip of rabbity roadkill, he learned not only that prayers are sometimes answered but also the kind of severe effort they entail, the kind of endless frantic summoning," This is amazing how vivid he paints the picture of his childhood rabbit. His point of this introduction, I think, was to highlight how "He would grow up to become a great prayer, this little boy, but only intermittently, only fitfully, praying only when fear and desperation." 

He then introduces everyone's favorite childhood program. Mister Roger's Neighborhood. Honestly, I felt legitimately blasted back into the past by this profile. "You were a child once too." That's what Junod wrote as a Segway into some of the philosophies that Mister Roger spoke about in his day to day life. Through his descriptive storytelling voice, I was really able to envision the stories he told about how Mister Roger's helped os many children. From the Ophthalmologists needing a way to stop children from being scared of them, to the story about the young boy with cerebral palsy, the school shooting, or the little boy who didn't know who he was. The narrative was just so hard to peel myself away from him. Junod was even able to capture how incredibly sensitive and caring that Fred Rogers was. He was truly a remarkable human being. He had a reason for doing everything and he tried his best to help all the children across the country.

Junod led me in with the written visualization of the opening scene of this famous children's program, "THE OLD NAVY-BLUE SPORT JACKET comes off first, then the dress shoes, except that now there is not the famous sweater or the famous sneakers to replace them, and so after the shoes he's on to the dark socks, peeling them off and showing the blanched skin of his narrow feet. The tie is next, the scanty black batwing of a bow tie hand-tied at his slender throat, and then the shirt, always white or light blue, whisked from his body button by button." He captured the entire essence of the scene that I suavely caught when I was just walking in the door from school and my TV was on PBS. 

I also feel that Junod did an impeccable job when he quoted Mister Rogers in his whole being. He was truly writing this piece in third person omniscient because of how he reveals every detail slowly and perfectly as if he knows them beforehand. His writing was extremely intimate and truly felt entranced in his words. I felt as if I was right there with both of them as they were traveling around from place to place. He encased his whole being in every situation they faced on the streets around he people that ran up for autographs, hugs,and prayers. For example, when he wrote about the little boy who hated himself for having cerebral palsy, it was extremely heart wrenching for me to read because I know someone like that, who acts like that at times. He put me there in his writing he make me feel and believe with just a tap of the keyboard. They say the best type of writing are those that can evoke a passionate response from you. Tom Junod did just that for me. He made me feel as if I was right there with them both. 

Why I say this profile made me rediscover my childhood? It made me feel young again. Mister Rogers made every child, including myself, feel special, smart, and strong. It made me relive one of my favorite theme songs, or rather my favorite openings, because I am a fan of TV show openings, and feel the way I felt at seven years old. His own experience through his multiple meetings with Mister Rogers even felt relatable because he felt the same way I did. He felt young again I think when he got around him and that showed the power Mister Rogers had over the people that truly admired him.