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Look, I know how loud the outside world can be.
I live in it, just the same as you.
The noise of car tires, engines, and other people theyre all there to give me a headache.
How do I alleviate my distaste of busy, loud places?
I wear some of thebest noise-canceling headphones.
Or at least Idid.Until last week, after my second near-death experience related to ANC headphones.
One saw me wearing a pair, and the other was down to someone else wearing some ANC earbuds.
Near death a tale in two parts
At lunchtime, I like to go for walks.
Every day, I cross the road in the same place outside my house.
At lunchtime, its generally nice and quiet, and I dont see all that many cars pass by.
I always look both ways and cross both ways just to be safe.
So that I dont get hitby a car.
Its something thats become second nature, until one day a couple of weeks ago.
There is a hitch, though.
Previously, Ive never had to worry until a couple of weeks ago.
I was going out for my lunchtime walk, the sun high in the sky.
I popped my earbuds into my ears, grabbed my coat, and left the house.
Unfortunately for me, it was not.
Idontlike the sound of the city.
Its overwhelming, a cacophony of awful that pervades every sense like a treacly ooze.
Unfortunately, it seems like others dont do the same.
I was walking a route Ive followed what feels like hundreds of times before.
I waited for the green man to illuminate, and I began walking across the road.
That they can cruise through.
How do I know?
Because after picking ourselves up off the floor, the cyclist was uncommonly apologetic.
Im so sorry, he said, I was just completely lost in my own world.
Is there a time and a place for ANC?
Its an issue thats ongoing, and its unlikely to see consensus anytime soon.
