An Indulgent Dancer

First learning the artist Khalid Alkaaby, I was viewing his series of women dancers in red. Often times red and women figures tend to remind me of the erotic sense. I suppose what's interesting about 

The above painting is "Be Free.. Dance With Me" by Alkaaby in 2015. Like most of his works, a dancing woman is at the foreground with the blank space as background. 

Color and light are definitely outstanding here. The use of red feminizes the dancer and also stands for her enthusiasm and love for dancing. The choice of red here is rather modest, neither too deep nor too light. One of the things I like about this painting is that red does not give any erotic sense- the artist let most of the red in shade and the only red highlighted renders viewers to focus more on the color itself. The lightened red serves to separate different sections of the painting and notify the transitioning of her movement. The edge of her skirt goes with her hip; the hair accessory responds to her eyes and inevitably guides the gaze to her elbows and hands. Thus her motions and movements are being elaborated and her passion on dancing suggested by red are expressed through her face. 

Color changes from dark to bright as she moves her body, which is outlined by the light. The dim bottom part looks a bit heavier than the rest and her hands, the lightest. The blurring at her lower body includes her in the background, in her own secular space but yet her hands, delivering her motions are beyond her little world. Instead of a foreshortening effect, the shadows on her arms transit the movement from her upper body to her hands- the hands are almost out of the space, out of the painting, out of her world, yet remained as an integral. She is indulging herself in her own personal land, but her skills and enthusiasm guide her out to another level. 

I saw her love for dancing. It reminds me of the flamenco dancers- they dance because they feel like to. They do not care whether they have viewers. They just dance, because the music awakens the part of her soul. 

I might want an excuse to dance, which being, I feel like so. 

Do you like him because you like him, or because he likes you?

Many of us at least have ever had asked our dates, "Why do you like me?" But girls, why do you end up with him?

He's smart. He's funny. He's rich. He's experienced.

But what if he does not treat you well?

Do you still like him?

How do we usually describe a guy? He's sweet. He's cute. We tend to measure a guy by how much he has done for us, don't we?

Yes, I've said that we all love jerks. Because the one that wins us by treating us well is not always our best choice.

I've been thinking that maybe it is right- men do know what love is, whereas women only choose to be with a man that knows how to treat her well. In the very beginning, we are attracted to certain attributes to this guy. Later on, it is how they treat us that decides whether we want to carry on or not. In the past, I was very still young. If this guy did only one thing I did not like, I would never be involved with him again, regardless the other 1,000 things he did for me. So I drove myself crazy. Now I look back, that was too immature. Our ultimate goal is to be happy. If he is perfect but he does not appreciate you, will you still be happy? Let me make this clearer. A has $10,000,000, but he would not give you anything. B has $500,000 and he gives you $100,000. Which do you want?

Be your own judge.

LOVE> School?

Recently, there is a hot video on Facebook where Michelle Obama was telling our fellow girls that there is no man at this age cute enough for us to forgo our education.

That's more than true, yes, from my real life experience.

So you may argue that maybe a mature man, say a 30 something or even a 40 something might be a different discussion. Well, honey, not really (yes, I've been there). One thing that we need to keep in mind is, what does an older man like about a girl in her early 20s? Of course, youth- many of us may not notice. But a 30 something and a 20 something do look different- I'd like to ascribe that to the loss of collagen, all those early wrinkles, sagging muscles.... If you are young, you are naturally beautiful- I am not just saying. Once you pass 20s and go on to 30s, what do you have? There are lots of young girls out there- they think they are smart and beautiful as what we now think we are. What would you do if you were the older man? Would you be stuck with an aging woman or looking for some young passion?

So here is the deal- girls, focus on your education/ career. Once you've stepped out of the path, it is not that easy to go back- at least it took me a lot of sweats to stay in the right track. Let me throw this out, you give up your education/ career to love him. So what do you mean by loving him? I mean, how? Just to be with him every day? Cooking, doing laundry, cleaning? Hmm, you are sure you want to do this? Come on, girls, you are just being lazy- you want him to pay your bills so that you can buy your nice shoes and clothes. Ok, I know you are going to say you like him not (only) because of his $$, but his personality and his experience. Honey, then why does he want to share his adventures and $$ with you if you are so easy to get and be replaced?

First of all, focus on your goal to make you a better person. It can also make him feel that you are not that easy- you are unavailable sometime, so that he will try to get you (we all like men making efforts to get us, right?). What's next? So when you get to your 30s, you are still fabulous- in the very beginning he might just be attracted to your appearance but as he knows more about you, he finds out you have a personality and everyday he's learning something new about you (oh, I start to like this version of you too). How would he not want to keep you? Well, if anything, he turns out to be a shallow jerk, you still have your career- you won't lose the world, but just creating more opportunities for yourself and other better men to be crazy for you...


Yours Truly ;)

what's wrong with women?

We always say that when women get together, there is trouble. We start to compare, and each of us want to be superior than the other. We complain that men never know us. But as a woman, why we never sympathize for our fellow women, unless they are way better or way worse than us that we already figured out there is no chance we can be at the same level?

What's wrong with us, women?

Last few weeks I have been followed by some random people in the street. At first I ignored them, begging them to go away when realizing I would not talk to them- and they did. Yet it did not always work. The case that came to my attention was last Wednesday around 9pm, I was walking back home from school. While this guy started to follow me on C st., I told myself I over thought. Then, at each following intersection, he would ask turn left? turn right? At first I thought he was just talking to himself until at one intersection I looked into the window of a shop, and from the reflection, he was really leaning to me and facing me asking whether to take a left or right. I was so freaked out and changed my pace. However, it did not work. I was mentally struggling what to do, should I call 911? But apparently he did not do anything illegal, and if he had, it would be too late to wait for 911. So I stopped at G st., where my home located, and pulled out my phone from the backpack, attempting to call my friend- I could not think of anything else to do. He then realized I caught him. So he stopped as well, staring at me and cursing me. I turned around and went another way. In the next few blocks, I met him again. This time, there was another guy with his friends walking towards me and he told me, "Miss, you've been followed." I looked at him almost helplessly, "I know. What can I do?" Oddly enough, the stalked disappeared.

So I started to concern about my safety. I never want some stalkers or random people to know where I live. I posted this concern online where only people from my community can get access to. So at first they referred me some walking escort service and some even offered to walk with me if time matches. Well, there were others starting a discussion on whether to call 911 and telling me that these "stalkers" identified by me did not do anything illegal. I mean, I know. I just wanted to get some advice on walking escorts. If this does not work, I will find out another way- not like I am saying I want police to arrest all those stalkers. The most interesting part is that, at today's lunch break, I guess people were being too available, they started to question me how I define a stalker. They were even making themselves to be kind by saying "obviously this girl is still very young and believes every person walking around her were stalking her"- yes, young as if I was born yesterday (then I would admire myself for the ability to type and walk at the age of 1- day old). I mean, really?

Gladly enough, there were other people clarifying for me saying that I just do not want to feel threatened when walking at night.

Yes, you are right. People questioning me were all women, no exception. Well, sure, there were women backing me up as well. But seriously? As a woman, we know more than men how it feels when there is another man at night walking behind you, especially for 6 blocks, and curse you? I can never forget the way he looked at me, the anger, the shame.

We, women, want our voice to be heard, and we happen to be those that stop ourselves. Interesting enough huh? How can we change this male dominant society if we are not respecting other women?

Why do we all love jerks?

Has it ever occurred to you that one day you woke up, you feel like life is going so smoothly and so well that you are starting to freak out?

When we are available, we complain not having someone to share intimacy. When we are seeing someone, we cannot stop spotting his bad. And here comes the worst thing, when we have a choice.

When we are seeing several guys in a row, we compare them and maybe think about which to put more attention on.

- He is cute and loving.
- He is rich and I like the sex with him.
- He is a jerk but there is something with him that I just can't get over.

Yes, that is the case. A good catch can never beat a jerk. We meet the perfect man in the daytime and at the end of the day, we just feel there is something missing and all we can think of is that jerk. So, here goes the devil's hotline. When he picks up the call and says he would be coming over, we cannot help but making ourselves look cool before he comes- airbrush, candles, scents, music, red.... Hmmm, what if he does not pick up the phone? We text. While we are waiting, we think about all his good. Maybe we don't like him being too aggressive, too blunt, and too irresponsible. But so what? He makes moves because he wants me badly, which means he cares and likes me. He does not have enough time but we had fun...

When he texts back, oh my god, we go crazy. He says yes- we continue to make hair, choose dresses.... He says no- we ask and try to figure out a time to meet. Our desire just gets stronger and stronger and so we tell ourselves that we hate this man in the day but we eventually want to sleep with him- that's love.

It takes time for us to realize, or well, to face the truth. Then we find out he is totally a jerk. But what does that matter? We will find the next jerk and probably we love this jerk at some point. Yes, we find the right jerk.

So you ask me why do we all love jerks? Because we don't want easy. Honey it is that simple. You want to avoid jerks? You need to change the default then.