CAN WE LOCK love in and NEVER lose it?
The first time I ever saw these “Love Locks” was few years ago while on a family get-a-way. We were visiting the Othello Tunnels in the Coquihalla Valley about 30 minutes East of Hope, BC. This was the movie shooting location about 30 years ago for the wilderness scenes in “Rambo – First Blood”. It looked really dangerous in the film, but in fact, the film and production crews were just a few feet away on the tourist walkway below the rock walls.
At the end of one of the paths I saw several dozen of these padlocks attached to a chain link fence designed to keep tourists from falling into the ravine below. My daughter knew all about these and explained this very Parisian custom in great detail.
It appears lovers all over the world have (mostly since the early 2000’s) been carving and writing their names on padlocks, locking them to a (seemly) permanent landmark, and then throwing the key away. In this case, by the Othello Tunnels, the keys were thrown into the raging rapids of the Coquihalla River, never to be found again. The idea is that the locks are permanent and could never be unlocked without the key. These padlocks were for each couple a “symbol” representing their hopes, dreams and love for all time.
I have since then
seen these “Love Locks” in many places. Regardless of all the rhetoric to the
contrary it appears we humans are looking for a “permanent” love after all. We
all want someone to grow old with. We all want someone to be there with us for
all of life’s happy moments and even more so for life’s more difficult moments.
We all want someone we can trust with our lives. We all want someone who will
always consider us in every decision. We all want what we had at the beginning
to last a lifetime. We want to “feel” as we did at the beginning… always. We
all want our love to make tomorrow better than yesterday.Then comes life… wind…. waves… storms…. drought…. and battles to be fought. We suddenly begin to think our “life raft” would be safer …. more stable, if we got rid of the other person rocking it….. too much dead weight…. not enough help. This ride is not fun anymore!
Oh… if only we could lock our love in as easily as a five dollar lock to a railing or fence.
I can’t help but wonder how Alexander & Jenny, Audi & Charlotte are doing since that day in 2013, and all the others who started out with such hope and promise…. I wonder?
______________________________________________________
Photos Courtesy of ABSFreePic.com
No comments:
Post a Comment