I’m all for thinking things through, clear-eyed and courageous. When faced with a problem, the best approach is to consider the various solutions from every angle.

Some situations, however, don’t bear thinking about. The more you do think about them, the more inclined you are to run off and do something superficial, like painting your toenails or standing in front of the home improvement store’s paint color chart, trying to imagine your bedroom walls.

Take organ donation, for example. I’m an organ donor. Every time I renew my driver’s license, I renew my organ donation vow. But do I think my organ donation decision through? Not through to the good my organs might do for someone else; I’m talking about the process itself.

As confident as I am that organ donation is the right choice for me, I don’t want to imagine the scene immediately after those organs become available. My mind balks like a recalcitrant toddler refusing to bend her body into the shopping cart seat.

Just Thinking:It's ironic that COVID finally hits home

And that’s fine. I long ago decided that, unlike donating blood, donating organs doesn’t require understanding every step of the process.

Now colonoscopies. We all know how important they are. If we didn’t know because we studied the importance of examining changes in the large intestine, we know because we like Katie Couric. Either way, a wise person takes a deep breath and endures what I think of as the dreaded prep before presenting herself at the hospital for the procedure.

And then what? Well, then you get relaxing drugs and wake up in one of several curtained recovery alcoves, where a loved one is waiting to write down the funny things you say as you’re emerging from the anesthetic.

That’s it. You can focus on what happens between the relaxing drugs and waking up if you want, but I won’t. I know all about conscious sedation and how you chat about your dog and whether you plan to see the Bob’s Burgers movie and sure, I can turn on my side and, no, that doesn’t hurt, and really? Just like a coil of Italian sausage, huh? How interesting, doctor, and that’s exactly the part I don’t want to think about.  

Just do the procedure, wheel me into the curtained place and let’s never speak about that for which I was awake but not awake. It’s difficult enough to look at my watch there in the alcove and wonder where those 43 minutes went. Or rather, where I went during those 43 minutes. Or, well, you know what I mean.    

Dental work is less intrusive than a colonoscopy (if you’re lucky), but even in the dentist’s chair, I have no desire to see what’s happening from the dentist’s point of view. Do your work, doctor. Choose from your silver instruments and go about your scraping or packing or drilling or smoothing without courteously offering me a glimpse of the goings-on in that mirror up there or on the screen in the corner.

If I wanted to understand root canals or extractions, I’d have gone to Google or dental school. What I prefer to do is close my eyes and think about the errands I’m going to run when I walk out into the sunshine again. Until then, you think about what you do, and I’ll think about whether we still need gemelli or did I buy that last week.

Other doctors apparently learn in medical school to distract patients. I have a doctor who smoothly slips into questions about my family and grandchildren at sensitive moments. I appreciate the reasoning and don’t exactly object to the practice, but it’s a little unsettling, like being asked to recite the state capitals while screaming around curves and plunging down hills on a roller-coaster. Somehow, it makes the roller-coaster more vivid, not less.

I realize that my reluctance to look reality in the teeth is a form of cowardice. “You just don’t want to face facts,” I hear you saying. And I agree; I don’t. When I need to face facts, I face them. When I don’t, I hum that song about always looking on the bright side of life, unless it’s the one about you having a friend in me. Either one will do, if I hum it loud enough.    

Email Margo Bartlett at margo.bartlett@gmail.com.