The list we would rather not write

A man in Al Wakra had a routine blood test last month. The results arrived by email a few days later. The message is still in his inbox, unopened, a little further down every morning.

He is not busy. He is afraid. As long as he does not read it, nothing in it is true yet.

Most of us keep a few of these. The noise in the car we turn the radio up to cover. The friendship that went quiet after something we said. The conversation with an ageing parent about where they will live, postponed every visit. The habit a doctor once mentioned and we never brought up again.

The reason we do not look is not laziness. Looking would cost something. If we really saw what was in front of us, we would have to admit a mistake, give up a plan, rearrange what we spend our time on, or act. Not looking keeps all of that at a distance.

It goes deeper than avoiding the things themselves. Most of us would struggle even to write down what we are avoiding, because seeing it written would be frightening on its own. Naming it would mean knowing it is there.

So we look at other things. The busy, comfortable, urgent things. They are real enough, and they keep our eyes occupied.

The trouble is that the result in the email does not change because it is unread. The noise in the car does not stop because the radio is loud.

All that not looking protects is the feeling of being safe, and that feeling does not last.