Juan José Millás explores the human cost of comfort

In this literary piece, Juan José Millás uses a surreal dream about a highway constructed from human backs and animal bodies to offer a social commentary on the nature of modern comfort. The author describes a flexible road made of vertebrae, skin, and bone that yields under the weight of vehicles, noting how society has become desensitized to the labor and lives that support its infrastructure.

Millás argues that this reliance on the labor of others—such as delivery workers, farmers, and nurses—is a social construction rather than a natural phenomenon. He suggests that human habituation acts as an anesthetic, allowing people to live atop the efforts and sacrifices of others without questioning the true cost of their convenience.