The NHL lockout hasn’t been good for anybody. It especially hasn’t been good for a fighter in his mid-30s who can’t find a job in Europe and knows he only has a few years left to get paid. 

“I'm aware of how much money I lose every morning when I wake up,” Bruins forward Shawn Thornton told WEEI.com Tuesday. “Let's just say I'm not smiling every morning when I wake up to get my coffee thinking about how much I'm going to lose today.”

Though many of the league’s stars and a number of Thornton’s teammates have been given the opportunity to make money playing elsewhere during the lockout, the 35-year-old bruiser -- who has never made $1 million in any of his professional seasons -- hasn’t been that fortunate. He’s looked into playing in Europe, but the opportunity has yet to present itself. There was some talk of him going to play in Belfast, where his mother was born, but money issues over his insurance policy got in the way. 

Thornton doesn’t like to complain about money, because he knows his situation as a bottom-end NHLer (he made $800,000 last season) is way better than the average person’s (“I’ve made a ton of money,” he admitted). He also knows that those paychecks won’t come forever, so the fact that he’s drawn as hard a line as he has against the owners’ proposals should tell you all you need to know. 

“I'm on the lower end, and I only have a few years left, so I get screwed as hard as anybody, and if anybody should be pushing to take this deal, it would be a guy like me,” Thornton said. “And there are some things in that deal that you couldn't -- I wouldn't sign off on it yet. I don't want to get into specifics, but there are certain things that it's not doable yet for us to take it. Until we get to that point, it's not going to go anywhere.”

Since the lockout began, Thornton has simply tried to keep busy and keep optimistic. He’s been skating with some Bruins teammates (Daniel Paille and Brad Marchand on Tuesday) and other local NHLers. Other than that, he went to Oshawa last month to skate with the Generals of the OHL, took a trip to Bermuda to watch Keegan Bradley in the Grand Slam of Golf and has been in and out of meetings as the league and the players try to come together.  

“It's been a lot of the same around here,” Thornton said. “Get up early, go skate, work out, do something in the afternoon to make sure you're on top of it. A lot of waiting, a lot of being patient.”

And a lot of biting his tongue. It’s clear that Thornton is frustrated -- or “absolutely pissed off,” in his words -- but he is being careful to avoid saying anything that could create any more friction than there already is between the two sides. 

“I'm just trying to not be as emotional as I'd like to be because it just gets me all fired up,” he said. “That doesn't really do anything, except when I'm sparring with my boxing coach, and he doesn't like it.”

Mark Recchi recently told Kevin Paul Dupont of the Boston Globe that players should take whatever the league is offering because the offer is only going to get worse over time. Thornton’s spoken to Recchi about their differing views on the lockout, as the two have kept in close contact over the last few months. 

Recchi believes that the deal is never bad as it looks, as the last collective bargaining agreement was viewed as a loss for the players, but everyone got their money in the end. Thornton doesn’t see it that way, as he feels the league has given union head Donald Fehr very little to work with. 

“I think we have a smart guy in charge in Don Fehr,” Thornton said. “Obviously he works for the union, and he has our best interests in mind. We pay him to be the smartest guy in the room and we voice our opinions on which way we want to go, but at the end of the day you have to remember what you've hired him for. I think he's done a great job so far trying to navigate through this as best as possible because it hasn't been easy on the other side. I mean, in this last offer, there's nothing that the players get out of it. It's just all take, take, take.”

As Thornton says, he knows what he’s giving up by not being on the ice. He knows that if he loses this year of earning, he’s not going to get it back, but he feels it would be worth what he loses if the end result is a better deal for all the players going forward. 

“But my opinion wouldn't matter anyway,” he added. “I'm one of 700, so you have to have everyone on the same page to make anything happen. We're waiting for something that the players can accept.”

If that acceptable offer is extended and a new collective bargaining agreement is reached, Thornton’s workload will be more challenging than that of other players. A shorter schedule means a more compressed schedule, and for a player who takes a pounding as a frequent fighter, Thornton will have less time between games to heal. 

“I like to think I give the poundings more than I take them!” Thornton exclaimed. “Yeah, I play a physical game, but I played in the minors for nine years. It will never be worse than that. There's no three-in-threes [three games in three nights], so I don't care how compressed it is.

“I like playing. I prefer to play,” he added. “I'd play every other day if that's what they wanted. As long as the travel isn't too bad, it's fine. It doesn't affect me.

“I've said it in the playoffs before: Tired's just a state of mind. You can tell yourself you're not tired. That's what they make coffee for.”

Tired may be a state of mind, but there isn’t enough coffee in the world to make Thornton any less tired of waiting. Only a new CBA can fix that.