Cadenas

Padlock (Eng.)/Cadenas (Fr.) noun:

• A portable or detachable lock, with a pivoted or sliding shackle that can be passed through a link.

Walking across the Pont de l'Archeveche, I couldn't help but stop to take in the sight of thousands of padlocks which are affixed to its railings. They come in all shapes and sizes, old and antique, but they all have one thing in common, the promise of eternal love.

For years, love-struck couples and love-lorn individuals have been engraving these padlocks with their initials and adding their sentiments, affixing them to the railing and tossing the key into the Seine below. It is said to symbolize their eternal love, under the watchful eye of Notre Dame nearby. This is not specific only to this particular bridge, and I think this concept originated in China. Earlier this year, the Paris government removed them all in a bridge clean up effort, which you would never know by the amount of padlocks that have already appeared.

As I strolled throughout the streets of Paris, I couldn't believe how many other random padlocks that I spotted. Had they been there all along and I am just now noticing them beacuse of my experience on the Pont de l'Archeveche? That got me to thinking... had every person that I saw on the street (of which there were hundreds if not thousands) experienced this sense of eternal love? 

If not, then why? Or better yet, I like to think that the question is, when?