Meet the Vices.

My vices dropped by last week, unexpected of course. They were vigorously intent on making up for lost time. It's been months since I've spent any real quality time with them--but you know how it is with vices, they always think it's been too long, you always think it hasn't been long enough.

Late-Night was the first to visit, which makes sense because he's particularly fond of overstaying his welcome. Shortly after came Late-Morning, who was invited by Late-Night because he swears it's always more fun when they're together. Forgetfulness was the next to arrive, I'm not sure when exactly, but by late last week he had already provoked me to lock myself out of my apartment twice--one of those times being in the rain, without an umbrella, on my way to an audition. Bingey would not stop bugging me about getting frozen custard, which we made two consecutive trips downtown to get, and I'm pretty sure he's the reason why my Golden Oreos keep disappearing. Impatience even stopped by...it wasn't that bad, though, he didn't stay for long.

I thought by then I had seen them all--when lo and behold, lurking in the corner stood an old vice…Anxiety. I was probably most surprised to see him. I mean, I still hear about him through friends, but it's been years since we've hung out one-on-one, so it was definitely an awkward hello we exchanged…well mine was agitated more than awkward. Just when I thought I was finally getting real closure on the sucker too.

It wasn't long before I had enough. I wasn't going to subject myself to this again. I confronted the vices and told them frankly that they came uninvited, and while a day or two is okay, I don't have a place for them to stay, not anymore. It's taken me months to dilute their influence, and I wasn't about to lose that progress and let them wreck the place.

"The difference between a virtue and a vice is that a virtue you have to think about."

- N.T. Wright