When did we lose touch with sensuality, intrigue? Everything these days seems to be an in your face rebellion. Have women forgotten the art of allure?

My friend, newly single, went clubbing this weekend. At 48, she wore her 16 year old daughter’s dress out for the evening. She takes care of herself, looks great, but just because you can wear it doesn’t mean you should. There is something to be said for age appropriate dressing. And another friend commented to our male companions as a parade of young girls swished by with juicy across their derrieres, “Feels like a promise, doesn’t it?”

Miley Cyrus’ video Wrecking Ball kicked off this diatribe. The video’s cinematography was stunning. But despite the imagery I was left deflated. Licking a sledgehammer? All sexual innuendo intended. Are you kidding me? There is a stronger underlying aggression inherent in that image, a disdain and violence. When did the need to assert ourselves as strong independent women devolve? Is this what we have come to?

I fear more fathers will resort to donning a pair of denim daisy dukes just to make the point. And that is no prettier then swinging buck-naked on a wrecking ball or young starlets sliding out of your limos pantie-less. Or the numerous ways young women reveal all that God gave them to the world today.

Now I am not saying we shouldn’t fully embrace our sexuality or the beauty of our naked figures. And hurrah to the women throughout history who have pioneered this thought in American culture fighting for equality, contraception, and freedom. That taught us it is okay to talk about vaginas. Even I marched through Boulder one night topless alongside my male buddies because the feminist in me screamed if a man can do it I should be able to also. But somewhere I do believe we’ve lost our sense of balance.

What happened to the aloofness that French women are famous for? Their Je ne sais Quoi giving off an aura that says they know something about sexuality and seduction we don’t. Brigid Bardot’s I just tumbled out of bed seductive disarray, an understated sensuality like an invitation.

Debra Olliver, Author of “What French Women Know: About Love, Sex, and Other Matters of the Heart and Mind.” writes of French women “Not only were these women a sensual and resilient counterpart to the one-size-fits-all beauty standard advocated around us — they weren’t cookie-cutter pretty, but they had that maddening French capacity to transform quirky peculiarities, even ugliness, into compelling sexiness.”

And in the true nature of a French woman Miley should tell me to Casse-toi; since French women don’t care what others think of them. Perhaps their most beautiful trait of all is their I-don’t-give-a-damn attitude.

I don’t know about you but I want to be comfortable in what I wear. I want to grab hold of my je ne sais quoi and let it linger in the room like my perfume. Not put it on display for every Tom, Dick and Harry. I want to leave something for the imagination, a subtle invitation to my significant other of everything that lays underneath, a present waiting unwrapping.

Image: Here