Vinnie and I have been together for as long as I can remember. He was there when I took my clumsy first steps and was there for the clean-up during potty training. He gave me the confidence to keep climbing back on to my BMX after I bruised my knees and elbows learning to ride it. Vinnie taught me how to talk to girls and was there applauding when the disturbingly experienced Amanda gave me my first French kiss under the guava tree behind the main hall at school. He was there wincing with me as I took my first gulp of Vodka after the inter-schools’ basketball tournament and was patting my back and holding my head over the toilet bowl as I retched my bowels out later that evening. He gave me the courage to court the hottest girl on campus in college and guided my hands as I made love to her for the first time, which happened to be my first time as well. Vinnie held my hand through my first job interview and helped me breeze through 3 promotions in 2 years at that same company. Vinnie is my confidant, my shield, my brother, the best and the closest friend I’ve ever had. And now, I’m going to kill him.

Now that I have your attention let me start by putting your mind at ease, I’m not about to commit a felony. Well not in the traditional sense that would have me incarcerated but the consequences are no less severe.

I guess to add context to my ramblings I need to explain where my murderous intentions stem from. I was always a meek and introverted child. I was socially awkward and found it difficult to function in crowds. The two friends I made on my first day of Grade One are the same two I managed to sustain until the end of primary school. The good Lord didn’t bless me with any level of athleticism and it was a wonder that I wasn’t asthmatic to boot. I managed to scrape through academically and my reading and comprehension skills were just good enough for the school authorities not to place me in the special educational needs class. In the middle of all that awkwardness, however, I would get these occasional bouts of daring and perceptual stamina that would surprise and frighten me sometimes. I would pull a “rabbit out of a hat” and perform acts of uncharacteristic bravery that unfortunately wouldn’t sustain themselves. Then I would recede back into my shell.

I, however, always found solace in the fantastical world of cartoons and comic books. I related to the timid and soft spoken normal humans like Clark Kent, Bruce Banner and Hal Jordan that got upgraded with incredible versions that the world cheered and revered. It was during these formative years that I started feeling the presence of and unconsciously developed my alter ego.

During the befuddling years of puberty and High School is when the Ego came into its own, catalysed by peer pressure and raging hormones. I joined the public speaking and debate team and became their champion. I made new friends and even tried out for the basketball, rugby and swimming teams. I only managed to obtain a mascot position in the first two and became the breast-stroke guy in the mixed relay swimming team. I started rolling with one of the “cool kids”, became cool by association and girls started noticing me. One of my friends from primary school noticed the grandiose metamorphosis and instinctively started calling me Vinnie. When I quizzed him about the nick name, he said I wasn’t the old Alvin anymore and deserved a “cool” upgrade. I embraced the Superman to my Clark Kent and caroused in my new-found confidence well into adulthood. I would even engage in conversation with Vinnie which, much to the irritation and vexation of my wife, ended up looking like a madman talking to himself.

All was well, until I experienced The Quickening. Upon vowing to re-establish my relationship with Jesus, I came to terms with some uncomfortable truths. As much as Vinnie gave me the courage and mental fortitude to practically reinvent myself and excel, he was also responsible for the behaviours I wanted to walk away from. I came to a point where alcohol and the occasional high didn’t do the trick anymore and I started feeling genuinely guilty whenever I turned my head to look at another woman in the mall. Profanity and sexist jokes left a rusty metallic taste in my mouth and I couldn’t stand to watch horror movies anymore.

I viewed my relationship with Vinnie much like a marriage. I however had reached the point where I felt that our association had become toxic and unhealthy so I opted for a dissolution of the union. Romans 6:6 says “…our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed…” if my old man is dead then why do I still find myself wrestling with him?

In any divorce, you gather your thoughts, sign the papers and usher the undesirable party to the nearest exit. You shut the door behind them and proceed to live your new life in their absence. Simple, right? If so then why does one find themselves 3 months later engaging in the same pre-divorce behaviours and lifestyles while cursing themselves for their weakness and lack of self-control? I have found myself in this position on multiple occasions. So this time I decided to take a closer look at where exactly I was lacking.

I realised a fundamental flaw in my both my thinking and method. Maybe it stemmed from a naïve appreciation of the concept and process of divorce but I noticed where it was all coming undone. I recognised that separation transcends a simple disassociation with the significant other. Though you’ve gotten rid of the person, you once shared a life and space for the longest time. Some of their clothes are still in your shared wardrobe and still carry their scent. Their hideous taste in wall hangings still offends your walls and their half-eaten sandwich is still in the Tupperware container in the fridge. You reminisce about the good old days when you play their favourite playlist and see bits and pieces of them in the faces of your clique of friends. The person may be gone their presence is still felt. It’s like a copy of a copy of a copy of them. Faint, fuzzy and poorly rendered but the image is quite recognisable. Then one day you come home to find them sitting on their favourite sofa watching TV and asking you how your day was. It dawns on you that they kept their copy of the front door key when you kicked them out. Next thing you know, you’re sitting right next to them sharing a drink and having a top laugh like the divorce never happened in the first place. Right back to square one.

One of my favourite authors and evangelists, the late Dr Myles Munroe, once said that “Divorce is worse than death”. In divorce, after you complete the official annulment proceedings, the marriage is dead and buried. But as you go through life, there is a resurrection. You see them at the store or bus stop or even in church. It is the kind of death that is “never closed.” In death however, someone dies and you take them to the mortuary and they are placed in a box. People dress in black and go to a cemetery where the dead are placed in a hole. We pour dirt over them and are buried to be seen no more. Ephesians 4:22-24 instructs "... to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self ..." This got me thinking about my continually recurring predicament. Simply disassociating myself from Vinnie can never be enough to truly be free of his influence and power.

This time, after I expel him from my house I will collect all of his clothes, unmount all his repugnant paintings, collect the CDs and proceed have a massive bonfire in an open field. I shall wait until the last ember has extinguished then I will end Vinnie’s life for good and bury him in an unmarked grave. My old man, like a bizarre re-enactment of The Walking Dead, keeps coming back. I need finality and conclusion. Drastic and melodramatic as it sounds, I believe the death of Vinnie is the only way I can find the righteousness and holiness of Ephesians 2