There is a restaurant scene in the new movie “Beautiful Day
in the Neighborhood” in which Mr. Rogers, portrayed by Tom Hanks, invites his
interviewer to take a moment to consider “all the special ones who loved us
into being.”
I was already in full-lachrymal mode by this point, but
there, mixed in with the other diners, appeared the real Mrs. Rogers and members of the real Neighborhood TV team.
It was a fleeting but still moment, powerful to me as I too have been
reflecting on the personal forces that molded me.
Mr. Rogers had that quality that I have come to appreciate
from Zen Buddhism of listening, of giving one’s full attention to another
person, of even being the vessel for the other’s grief, confusion, fear, or
anxiety. Fostering that connection is
part of why I enjoyed the interview process so much when I worked for a
genetics journal, and it is why I do not enjoy speaking over the phone with
friends or family who multi-task during the conversation. Mr. Rogers puts it to his interviewer, "Do you know what the most important thing in the world is to me right now? Talking on the phone to [you]."
The movie profoundly resonates, too, in the transformation of the
interviewer himself, who had suffered the loss of his parents, one through
death, the other through abandonment.
How would he be able to forgive? His
dying mother, through a dream, allows him to release his anger by telling him that his anger isn't what she needs. I love how Mr. Rogers phrases the issue, "to forgive is a decision we make to release a person from the anger we feel toward them." How
hard I have worked on forgiveness for past injuries, and indeed making that decision was the first step.
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