“Well”, he muttered quietly to himself, flexing his shoulder back and forth a bit, the aches and grumpy tendons creaking against each other, “it could be worse”.
He rubbed the achy shoulder and heaved a tiny sigh of relief, and prayed the universal pessimist’s prayer of thankfulness without realizing it, in the back of his head:
“Thank you for the downpour of rain today soaking my shoes,
for some day I may be thirsty and without water.
Thank you for the blazing sun beating down and making an oily mess of my clothing,
for some day I may be frostbitten and without gloves or coat.
Thank you for the horrendously long and slow queue at the post office,
for some day I may be alone with no one to help me.
Thank you for the din of the cars and trucks careening around me on the road on the way to work,
for some day I may be deaf. And with no car. And unemployed.”
He stopped walking for a moment, peered down the long, hot and dusty path, wiped the sweat off his brow, and looked back at the burden which he had been dragging for quite some time.
The edges of the blanket at the end were starting to untie themselves again, meaning he’d have to stop and retie the tips together to keep the body of his former traveling companion from being left in the dust. And by the looks of the surroundings, there would be a lot of dust for a very long and dry future on this path.
“Yep”, he muttered to himself as he finished tidying the heavy and lifeless burden, “ha, could be worse. Could be me being carried.”