I am painting a master’s study. It’s Caravaggio; a beautiful oil blend with classical romanticism undertones and dark, stretching shadows. It depicts the Biblical story of Judith and Holofernes, where Judith saws off his head with a long, samurai sword. He belts in anguish, his face twisted and tortured. I find the image bewitching. I stand in the studio for hours on end until my feet go numb, mixing paint and inhaling the toxic fumes, contemplating every brush stroke as if my life depended on it. 

I watch my art teacher, a man I admire, critique these pieces. He categorizes them, dissects their meanings, and discusses their connotations. Oftentimes, we get caught up in long conversations, disagreeing on nearly everything. He challenges my beliefs, but respects me enough to hear me out. I like to believe that I am his favourite student. Sometimes, when he says something bigoted, or racist, or slightly homophobic, I find myself hesitating in correcting him. I feel my rage bubble in my stomach, feel my jaw tense and my fingers curl around my brush, but bite my lip and sit down, pretending to look at the murals on the walls. Maybe I am scared of his authority. Maybe I am scared of myself. 

For years, I have been terrifyingly acquainted with my anger. When I was in the eighth grade, I had my first and only violent altercation. Sitting in the dining hall of our overly palatial prep school, I focused on the silver stars hung on the walls and the feeling of my Mary Janes on my aching feet in an attempt to ignore the way her nails tapped on the table and the way she taunted me in front of our friends. She leaned in, provoking me. She slammed her hands down on either side of her ceramic plate, shaking every utensil on the wooden board, the table stretching to either end of the cafeteria. She stood, her face so close to mine that I could feel her breath on the tip of my nose. 

“What are you gonna do about it? Hit me? Hit me bitch. I dare you.” 

So I did. Before I could calculate my decision, I betrayed my every polite, feminine instinct, and raised my arm. I felt her face hit the palm of my hand, felt the sting that followed, and saw her stunned expression as she turned back around. 

 The room went silent. I sat down, shocked. 

The sudden tranquillity pressed against my eardrums, too loud to be contained by the cafeteria walls. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t speak. 

I went home, in disbelief of my aggression, my animalistic act. But I still wasn’t satisfied. I was still angry. I wanted to destroy something, anything I could. I wanted to feel something shatter by virtue of my shaking hands. I wanted to make something feel what I felt. I wanted the walls of my nauseatingly soft bedroom to close in on me, to scream in reflection of my rage. Yet I couldn’t punch holes in the drywall like my father did, I couldn’t aim well enough to hit a hardball. I couldn’t bring myself to hurt anything. Anything of value. So I destroyed myself. I dug my perfectly manicured nails into the palms of my dirty hands, pressing hard enough to draw blood. I traced blades along the folds of my thighs. I pressed the butts of cigarettes into my skin, begging for the burn that followed. 

When I used to discuss self-harm, I would do so in conversation with sadness. I don’t anymore. I associate it with anger. Blood. Pain. I wanted myself to suffer; to rage. It’s ironic, now that I think back on it, that I was attempting to punish my anger with more anger. I wanted to purge myself of it, to cleanse my body and purify my soul, offering my own blood as sacrifice. It was something that was so disgusting about myself, so repulsive, that I did everything in my power to hide it. 

The issue with femininity and womanhood is that we must repackage ourselves into something consumable and easily digestible. In regards to digestion, female rage might be the equivalent to drinking hydrochloric acid. Sadness, on the other hand, goes down as easily as warm chicken soup on a cold day. Our suffering is made consumable by our beautiful, helpless tropes. Stumbling down the cathedral steps in her soaking wet dress and a mess of hair. Sitting on the bathroom floor of a derelict apartment, her body small and braless, mind pitiful and drunk. Mascara running, sobbing with her head in her hands. All shatteringly sad. All painfully alluring. There is something about a sad woman that makes you want to love her. To pick her up and rub warm, soapy water into her back. To run your fingers through her tangled hair, to fix her. There is something about an angry woman that makes you want to look away, to shame her for her chaos, to hate her. 

My sister has never been quiet about her rage. She knew what people said about her. In her last year of high school, I felt like I was on screen for a very specific 2000s’ rom-com, with her playing the “heinous bitch” Kat Stratford, and I as her sweet little sister. She threw switchblades at trees for target practice and screamed at anyone who deserved it. As much as she was my hero, she was also my villain. 

When she and my father would fight, it was brutal. They screamed at each other to no end, disagreeing on everything from politics to the way she tied her shoelaces. I remember instances where I thought to myself, why can’t she just stop? Why can’t she just sit down and be quiet, and end this suffering for us all? 

I resented her. I resented the way she stood up for all of her opinions, I resented the way she always seemed to be angry at the world. I resented the way she expressed her rage. Even though my father’s voice nearly swallowed her whole in their quarrels, I painted her as the villain. Even if she had every right to be angry, I expected her to sit down and take it, because that is what I would do. That is what women should do. We expect men to be angry. It is often their only expression of emotion. Angry men are desired. In their possession, even in abuse. We see it as protection. A helplessly sad woman and an angry, incandescently wrathful man is a fan-favourite relationship trope. But when a woman is angry, she is evil. She is a bitch. She is embarrassing, bratty, and every other degrading name in the book. 

In compensation for my sister’s anger, I became the exact opposite. I can’t argue without crying. I can’t yell without laughing. I feel as if I must laugh at myself for my ridiculousness, my embarrassing display of anger. It mustn’t be taken seriously. 

Looking back, the greatest accumulation of my rage, my one violent experience, was prompted by people who wanted a show. She wasn’t angry on her own. She didn’t truly want me to hit her. She, too, was badgered. She was egged on by cruel children in my class who wanted entertainment. They wanted a rancid display of anger, wanted some angry bitches performing angry bitch slaps. We weren’t angry at each other. We were equally fed up with being treated like american girl dolls, our hair pulled and groomed, until we finally gave in to their incessant torture and gave them what they wanted. 

Why is it so evil for me to want to unleash my anger onto something else? I don’t mean my careful brush strokes or my delicate, secretive self harm. I want to be able to saw off a man’s head. I want to scream, and fight, and argue. I want to be destructive. I am sick of sweet, or beautiful, or helpless or tortured anymore, I want to be angry.

 I don’t want to study Caravaggio anymore. The more I stare at the paint, the more I see the Judith’s expression as disgusted, somewhat terrified by the murder she carries out. But this is my painting now. I will portray the heroine as whatever I want. I will render Judith’s face resolute and enraged. I will grant her stronger arms to pin him down, immobilized as she cuts through his throat. I will paint his eyes wide open, aware of what he has done and what is happening to him.

This is my self-portrait. I am in control.