What do you do with the mad that you feel?

Not often, but sometimes idealistic people will step in the ring and fight against the cold, cruel world and land a knock-out, personally I wish it would happen more often.

Many of my readers grew up watching Sesame Street and Mr. Rodgers Neighborhood on PBS, a public broadcast service. I had watched Sesame Street, but didn’t know Mr. Rodgers until I moved here. The show was popular and in production from 1968 to 1976, and again from 1979 to 2001. Reruns could be watched until 2007, then it was sadly permanently removed, at least officially.

The show was in jeopardy in 1969, right after the start, when President Richard Nixon decided to cut the budget in half, because he didn’t believe a children program was really necessary. The U.S. Senate held hearings to decided the faith of the program and an almost unknown, young show host, named Fred Rodgers, stepped forward to give a speech in behalf of the children’s program. He didn’t argue, he didn’t raise his voice, he gave his speech calmly and left with a budget that wasn’t cut in half, but instead had been raised to 22 Million.

At the beginning of his speech they didn’t want to take him serious, they were inpatient and they showed it.

I have a weak spot for good speeches and here is Mr. Rodgers jewel.

Mr. Rodgers was a nice and kind gentleman and every kid wanted to be his neighbor. He believed in values, he believed in children and I wish the people, who are responsible for today’s children’s program would be more like him.

Lately, it seems that a lot of  teenagers and young adults have anger problems and too often are we forced to read about it in our daily news. I don’t have a solution for everything bad that’s going on in the word, but something tells me that some old values would do some good right now.

What do you do with the mad that you feel

(by Fred Rodger)

What do you do with the mad that you feel
When you feel so mad you could bite?
When the whole wide world seems oh, so wrong…
And nothing you do seems very right?

What do you do? Do you punch a bag?
Do you pound some clay or some dough?
Do you round up friends for a game of tag?
Or see how fast you go?

It’s great to be able to stop
When you’ve planned a thing that’s wrong,
And be able to do something else instead
And think this song:

I can stop when I want to
Can stop when I wish.
I can stop, stop, stop any time.
And what a good feeling to feel like this
And know that the feeling is really mine.
Know that there’s something deep inside
That helps us become what we can.
For a girl can be someday a lady
And a boy can be someday a man.

Mr. Rogers got into TV because the first time he saw a TV show it had “something horrible on it with people throwing pies at one another…”  He stated,  “I went into television because I hated it so, and I thought there was some way of using this fabulous instrument to be of nurture to those who would watch and listen.”

Somehow I feel, Mr. Rodgers is needed for our children today more than ever~!