{"id":245,"date":"2022-06-11T00:00:59","date_gmt":"2022-06-11T00:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/andyrukes.ca\/greenroom\/?p=245"},"modified":"2024-11-07T12:44:30","modified_gmt":"2024-11-07T20:44:30","slug":"a-story-for-another-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/andyrukes.ca\/greenroom\/2022\/06\/11\/a-story-for-another-day\/","title":{"rendered":"A Change of Name"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.”<\/i><\/p>\r\n

\u2014 Augustine Of Hippo<\/p>\r\nToday marks the end of a long chapter in my life. One that began over twenty years ago in August of ninety-nine. I was forty-two years old and sold, gave away or threw out all of my possessions with the exception of two bags of clothes, a laptop, a box of photographs and a clock radio and headed west to Vancouver. I was divorced, broken-hearted and still struggling to grow emotionally. More afraid of staying close to family and friends than leaving. Seeing my trauma for the cancer it was.\r\n\r\nIf you asked me why I left at the time, I secretly believed that there was a chance to rekindle a lost love. Ironically a love that was rooted in the soil<\/i> I wished to remove myself from. And similarly rooted, was my desire to find some form of validation as an actor in the burgeoning west coast film industry.\r\n\r\nWhen I arrived in Vancouver one of the first things I did was to travel to Pacific Rim Park, as far west as I could go \u2026 or as far away as I could get \u2026 in order to dip myself in the ocean. It was my ritual to cleanse myself from my past. I can still remember the feeling. It was magical. I felt as if I were being cradled by Mother Earth. The connection was nothing short of spiritual. Around the same time, I marked myself with a tattoo that read, \u201cthe mark of my tribe is fearless is\u201d in a continuous band around my upper arm. But the most challenging thing I did was to legally change my name from Andrew Rukavina to Angelo Renai in an attempt to divorce myself from a family name that, for me, had scars deeper than any tattoo. I chose the name Angelo Renai because after forty odd years of initialling things I thought it would be a lot easier to keep it at \u201cAR\u201d and I liked that it made me personally accountable in my journey. Angelo Renai: Angel Reborn<\/i>\r\n\r\n\"\"All these memories came flooding back to me two months ago. In April of twenty-two, I posted a picture to my Facebook page of a sapling growing, seemingly impossibly, from a tree stump with the caption “No matter what happens in your life, you can start over”<\/i>. I posted it because it struck a nerve with me and reminded me of everything I went through at the turn of the millenia, everything I have experienced since then and, most importantly, understand how I have grown. Within a day of posting that picture, I decided to once again change my name, but out of celebration and acceptance rather than pain and rejection. I wanted it to be rooted in the gratitude for that experience. Gratitude has become the cornerstone of my worldview. In being grateful I accept that there is something greater than myself. I don\u2019t need to define it. Explain it. Prove it. I am simply grateful for everything in my life, every moment of my life. For all the people that were a part of my life. Including the man who\u2019s name I was saddled with. In this gratitude, I have found peace. Even as I write these words, I do so in gratitude for being able to do so. Honestly, I wish I could bottle it. Maybe that\u2019s what I\u2019m trying to do here, by writing a love letter to everyone I\u2019ve ever known. To say thank you for helping me become someone I truly love in a way I headed west to find. And so as the ebb of these past twenty odd years becomes a flow, my name returns to one of familiarity, away from the pursuit of perfection. I have to live with the fact I’m not perfect. I\u2019m just grateful that I recognize the imperfections are in the mirror.\r\n\r\nI like the name \u201cAndy Rukes\u201d. I think it suits me. I feel like I\u2019m finally home.\r\n\r\nHere\u2019s to a new beginning, a new chapter. And hopefully more, open, honest expression about that which I am truly grateful for, my life.\r\n\r\nThanks for reading,\r\nAndy Rukes\r\n\r\n<\/strong>\r\n

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“Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.”
\n\u2014 Augustine Of Hippo Read More …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t