on one's shoulders

Idioms  

1. As one's responsibility, as in The king carries his entire country on his shoulders, or The success of the conference rests on Nancy's shoulders. This metaphoric use of shoulders as the burden-bearing part of the body dates from the late 1300s.

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Example Sentences

That was the curse of dreaming: One woke to pallid reality, with neither wings on one’s shoulders nor goddess in one’s arms.

From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor

When one has an old man on one's shoulders one never can get rid of him.

From Phineas Redux by Trollope, Anthony

The probability that a cougar is gathering his muscles on a limb with the intention of bounding down on one's shoulders, is enough to make the bravest man uneasy.

From The Lost Trail by Ellis, Edward Sylvester

I've seen a great pudding come into the room all afire—just to remind one of the old country—when it has been so hot that one could hardly bear a shirt on one's shoulders.

From Harry Heathcote of Gangoil by Trollope, Anthony

A large, immovable body which one is expected to carry on one's shoulders through the mud.

From The Stars and Stripes The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919 by United States. Army. American Expeditionary Forces