Singing in Public

On my way home from running circles around our local duck pond, I was not thinking about how absurd and gerbil like it is to run in circles around our local duck pond even if you put in variations in some futile attempt to fooling yourself into thinking that you are not running circles around our local duck pond, but rather I was thinking of little more than how much I would rather be at home, inside, out of the rain. That is to say that I was less distracted than normal and even somewhat alert. Just after I crossed the first of the two somewhat busy streets that lay between my house and the duck pond, I heard the sound of a voice.
I looked up to see a guy in a grey hoodie coming towards me, bouncing slightly as the walked, and all the while ranting. My first thought was that he was likely nutters. He was short on meds and now he was talking angrily to himself, likely of himself, and likely in third person.
As he neared, I could see that under his hoodie he was wearing what on first blush I charming wanted to call a Walkman, but really I all could see were earphones. They were large earphones and not the typical white earbuds that are ubiquitous these days and I suppose that is what made me think that he had a Sony product on the other end that would be older than him.
Actually he was young enough to wear his jeans half off his hip and crumpling around his ankles as if he had left the house that morning several pounds heavier. And as he approached, the ranting melted into a rhythm and that rhythm became rap. None of which is particularly unusual or unique.
What caught me was that at a certain distance, and I can't tell you now if it was five, ten, or twenty feet, but at a certain distance he stopped. He stopped echoing the angry words in his head. He passed me without a break in his stride and then at another, closer distance began again.
I was caught by how similar we were despite outward appearances. Despite me running by him in close fitting run clothes with shorts that are riding up as I run, as if I had the house a little thinner. Despite my being roughly double his age. If I had been the one with headphones on, I'd have done the same thing.