Remembering Uncle Rick: The one last drink I wish I had

"There are a lot of ways to describe Rick because he was so many things to so many people."

Rick Murrell tragically did not return home from a boating trip to Lake Manapouri.

Southland will today (Tuesday) farewell a popular member of its community, Rick Murrell.

On Sunday, July 20, Rick was tragically found dead on his boat after he didn’t return from a boating trip on Lake Manapouri. Police are continuing to make enquiries into the circumstances of Rick’s death on behalf of the coroner.

Rick’s niece, Sammy Murrell, pays tribute to her uncle.

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Last week I celebrated my 28th birthday at a pub in Invercargill with family and friends. I’m not much of a birthday person, but living overseas has made me treasure the birthdays I get to spend with my loved ones in Aotearoa.

The group eventually dwindled down to just family, and after a while, we finished our conversations and drinks and got ready to leave.

My Uncle Rick glanced around the table and raised his eyebrows as the rest of us shrugged our jackets on. “How about one last drink?”

We didn’t stay for one last drink. We figured there would be more birthdays, more Christmases, more weddings, more opportunities for one last drink to spend some extra time together.

None of us could have known that four days later, Rick would be found dead on his boat after he didn’t return from a boating trip on Lake Manapouri, a place he held close to his heart.

There are a lot of ways to describe Rick because he was so many things to so many people. He cherished his family and gushed about his half an Aussie Rules team of grandchildren to anyone who would listen.

Rick was a talented public speaker and knew how to work a crowd, which was helpful because he (like his brother/my dad, Bobby) never passed up an opportunity for an off the cuff speech.

His razor-sharp wit meant that no heckler was safe, especially not when those hecklers were his family or good mates. And it didn’t matter whether he was cracking jokes to a room of a hundred people or a small group around a bonfire; it never took him long to get people laughing, often at his own expense.

Rick was energetic, loud, and unpredictable. Whenever he started a sentence off with “You know what I think about [topic]?” there was a decent chance that I had no idea what he was going to say next.

I’ve lost count of the number of times I probably looked like a startled possum making eye contact with the person across the table at something he’d said. There were things we didn’t agree on, but I respected that he was curious about the world, eager to be challenged, and cared what other people had to say.

To borrow some imagery from the car sales industry where he built an impressive career spanning over three decades, Rick was the ignition, clutch, and engine of every social gathering: he sparked it to life, kicked things up a gear, and kept it going.

The Rick Murrell Christmas Experience quickly obliterated any newcomer’s expectations of a normal day with family.

For one, he consistently broke his own record of shortest time between entering the party and taking his shirt off. One year, he saved himself the trouble and showed up shirtless.

At some point, without fail, the day would result in an arm wrestling competition between Rick and whoever he cajoled into challenging him (usually my brother, Josh). He had a respectable win percentage, but that’s because he tended to cheat.

Rick (right) and his main arm-wrestling rival, Josh. No one knows what their head-to-head record is because they both give different answers.

Rick was not a perfect person and raised a few eyebrows in his lifetime, but his shortcomings were vastly outweighed by the virtues we loved about him.

Together with his wife, Andrea—who has a heart of gold—he served his community in so many ways that it was hard to keep up.

To give a few examples, he fought in a boxing match and cycled through snow from Milford Sound to Invercargill for charity, volunteered for the coastguard, engaged in local politics, and supported many ball- and bike-based Southland sports teams—and this is barely scratching the surface.

The tributes that have poured in over th,e past few days exemplify the impact he had and how deeply he’ll be missed by his community and industry.

Rick loved music and was the best air guitar player I’ve ever heard. His brothers would play actual guitars and he’d sit between them and sway with the music, eyes closed as he strummed his air guitar and sang at the top of his lungs, humming whenever he didn’t know the words. That’s how I feel now, trying to come to terms with the fact that he’s gone—the music is still playing, life around us is still going, and I don’t know the words.

So as we prepare to say goodbye to him on Tuesday, I’ll hum along to the songs he loved and remember him through the photos, videos, and collective memory of family and friends that tell the story of the remarkable life he lived.

This tragedy is a stark reminder to say yes to that last drink. Or the coffee catch up or the phone call, or the bike ride—whatever activity will give you a little more time with the people you love.

While I wish I could go back to last week and have that last drink, I’m grateful for the time I got to spend with Rick that evening and for every memory we shared in the last 28 years of the 60 he had.

• This article was published first on Sammy Murrell’s Substack Murrell of the Story and has been republished here with permission.