Las Cruces, NM — Lori Carson is used to hearing “thank you for the class” while students put their blankets and blocks away. Week after week, however, one man — Frank McKenzie — refuses to thank her for her class.
Carson tries to make eye contact with McKenzie when class is over to prompt him to say something. He will smile at her but never says a word. It is getting to her so much that at the end of each class she will say, “Thank you so much for joining me today” but looks only into McKenzie’s eyes and no one else’s.
To make matters worse, she has heard him say thank you when someone moved their mat over to make room for him. “I know he can say it. I can only assume he’s a republican,” said Carson. He is actually registered as a democrat.
Carson has also made a point to talk about gratitude at the start of every class, to be grateful for those who we encounter in this life that teach us things, whether they be our schoolteachers, our family, “or even,” Carson said specifically, “our yoga teachers.”
At the end of class, McKenzie routinely rolled up his mat and went on his way, like someone living his life.
Carson currently has an email to McKenzie saved in her drafts folder with the subject heading, “Help me understand.” She is getting closer and closer to sending it.
