Moonwalking with Mr. Rogers
I grew up with Mr. Rogers. He was a constant figure in my life – a real neighbor in the truest sense – whom I would regularly tune in to watch on PBS most mornings (“Channel 7,” as my brothers and I knew it back then). Mr. Rogers was a bit like that kindly old lady on your block who would let you visit after school and always have cookies ready for you, or the uncle at family reunions who would let you accompany him to the lake for a round of fishing while all the other cousins were forced to endure endless cheek-pinching by distant relations. In spite of his quiet demeanor, or perhaps because of it, Mr. Rogers always drew me in – and always garnered my full attention, to the point where I even forgot there was a TV set in between us. I remember feeling so distinctly as a child that here was a man who was talking directly to me – and perhaps even more importantly, seeming to listen fully to to me in return.
Oh sure, I’m not alone in this sentiment. Like me and many others, Peter Hartlaub is another fan of Mr. Rogers, a profuse apologist of Mr. Rogers’s ‘Hood – and so it was to Peter’s surprise as well as mine when he recently discovered and shared video footage of Mr. Rogers actually moonwalking during one long-past TV episode. Yes, as in Michael-Jackson-is-alive-and-well, wow-this-is-really-the-’70s moonwalking. Take a look:
As Peter recalls:
I’m a huge Mr. Rogers fan, but I somehow wasn’t aware of this video’s existence until this afternoon. Of course it only makes me love the guy more, if that’s possible. This just proves that Fred Rogers was physically incapable of being patronizing or self-conscious. He clearly knows nothing about breakdancing – and may have never seen a boombox. (“How do I turn your music on?”) This was a time when most squares in Middle America equated breakdancing with drive-by shootings and crack sales. But Fred Rogers was game anyway. And he looked cool trying to do it, because children are excited about it, and he was excited about children.
“Because he was excited about children.” Excited about children. I can’t think of any better attribute in a person.