Community remembers beloved friend
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ST. IGNATIUS — “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.” – Pericles
R.C. Murchie must have realized the truth of that statement. He certainly left his mark on the hearts of many in the Mission Valley with his warm, caring nature, bringing smiles to people’s faces even while suffering from cancer.
“He was such an awesome, awesome man,” Marilyn said. “I’m very proud that he was my husband.”
She didn’t always feel that way about R.C.
When the couple met in 1992, R.C. was a crusty man who cursed like a sailor, drank heavily and smoked pot, Marilyn remembers. She had gone to Tennessee to try to record music in a friend’s studio, and a friend of her friend happened to know R.C.
“I love to sing,” Marilyn said.
But she had to pay the bills, too, and ended up doing some work that R.C., who worked in drywall construction, found for her. While Marilyn worked on the jobs, R.C. offered to let her stay in a spare room in his trailer, so the two were roommates for a while.
“But I was just strictly business,” she said.
Then one day, she and R.C. went to work on a job together, and for the first time, she fully experienced his vulgar mouth and fiery temper.
“By the time noontime hit, I was about to quit,” Marilyn said. “I was just fuming inside.”
At lunchtime, she told R.C. she wouldn’t stick around if he wasn’t going to treat her like a lady and curtail his language.
“He said he’d try,” she remembered. “He was shocked that any woman would talk like that to him, but I meant it.”
Later that night, as R.C. sat watching television and drinking a beer, “with a cigarette in one hand and a joint in the other,” Marilyn picked up her guitar and sang a song she was recording at the time — “Calvary’s Land,” the first song played at R.C.’s memorial on Friday.
Soon Marilyn saw a different side of the loud, tough man she had worked with all day.
“All of a sudden he turned the TV off … and started listening to what I sang,” she said.
Gradually R.C.’s shell softened, and he let Marilyn get to know the man behind the tough facade.
“He started opening up to me about his life … it was a horrible life,” she said.
As R.C. shared his story with Marilyn, she shared a story with him that would dramatically change his life — the story of Jesus Christ. Marilyn explained that through Christ, R.C. could let go of the pain and bitterness in his life and find new hope for the future. The two started attending Nashville Cowboy Church, and Marilyn saw a transformation in R.C. immediately.
“His life literally changed overnight … he quit smoking and gave up the drugs overnight, literally,” she said.
The couple was married in 1993, and moved to the Mission Valley two years later. They knew only Marilyn’s brother and sister-in-law, and “by the time we got ourselves here and settled, we were literally down to coins,” Marilyn said.
But with R.C.’s vibrant personality at work meeting people, in just a couple of weeks the couple had several construction jobs lined up. Soon they were able to start The Master’s Touch Drywall, Inc., so named because of R.C.’s recent conversion.
“As the Master had touched his life, he had the desire to touch other people’s lives,” Marilyn explained.
Judging by the more than 500 people who packed the St. Ignatius Elementary multi-purpose room and overflowed into the school hallways for R.C.’s funeral service on Friday, and around 350 who attended a benefit dinner for Marilyn Saturday evening, R.C. did just that.
“To be perfectly honest, I don’t think there’s a person in this town or area he hasn’t blessed in one way or another,” said Ken Scott, who met R.C. and Marilyn soon after they moved to Mission.
Ken and his wife Adrienne and friend Mike Yoder organized a spaghetti dinner and auction for the Murchies after they learned in September that R.C.’s cancer, which had originally started in his throat in 2007, had returned with a vengeance. As R.C. passed away just five days before the benefit, the gathering doubled as a memorial for this man who had become a beloved member of the community in his 15 years there.
After his fight with cancer began, R.C. could no longer work construction, and took on several less strenuous jobs, including driving a school bus, substitute teaching and driving the Mariners’ bus in the summertime.
“He loved it, and those kids loved him,” Marilyn said of her husband’s bus-driving experiences. “It just enriched his life.”
No matter what R.C. was doing and through his battle with cancer, he kept a smile on his face, Ken remembered.
“He didn’t feel good, but he wasn’t going to let that slow him down or stop him,” Ken said. “He was just R.C. to the very last.”
R.C.’s positive and encouraging attitude spread through every area of his life, whether it was activities with the Hermanos bike club, for which he served as national chaplain, playing league golf, hosting foreign exchange students with Marilyn, or spending time with kids at Pinehaven Christian Children’s Ranch.
“He just loved people and loved to be friends with them,” Marilyn said. “He could bring smiles to people … if he felt like someone was down and needed encouragement, he would lift them up.
“He had tremendous love in his heart.”
R.C. shared that love with everyone he met and had many close friends in the Amish and Native American communities.
“I worked with him a lot,” Mike Yoder said. “He was a good friend.”
If R.C. could deliver a final message to his friends, it would be an encouragement to, “find forgiveness and grace and fill your hearts with love … live life to the fullest, and make it a life that’s worthwhile,” Marilyn said.
“He will be truly missed,” Ken added.
