April 2020

Home Sweet Home Office

I hope you and your family are safe and healthy.

How are you holding up?

Like most folks, I’m working from home these days, attending virtual meetings and making phone calls. 

The photo above is from my home office in Corolla. If you look closely, you’ll notice two things:

One: No beard.

I know it’s trendy these days to go full ZZ Top, but I’ve opted out of sharing my real-time werewolf transformation on Zoom. 

Besides, it would take months for me to go from zero to Kenny Rogers. Sure there would be some interesting stretches of George Clooney stubble along the way, but my wife is not a fan of face fuzz.

And I love my wife more than I hate shaving.

So there you go.  

The second thing you’ll notice? I’m smiling. 

I’ve always been an optimistic guy. Yes, times are incredibly tough right now, but this crisis will not last forever. I have hope.

Plus, smiling lowers your blood pressure and boosts your immune system.

That’s what I call a win-win right there.

I choose to focus on the positive. 

Lucky for me, there's plenty of good news in our community. Every day I read and hear stories about people stepping up to help out their friends and neighbors. First responders, medical professionals and essential workers continue to put themselves at risk to keep life moving forward.

And I meet every day with people in local government who are working hard behind the scenes to get our local economy safely back on track.

I’m grateful for their service and honored to be part of the team.

Speaking of gratitude, I’ve had plenty of time to count my blessings lately.

At least once a day I try stop and think about what I'm thankful for:

• I am thankful to be healthy and at home.
• I’m thankful to be isolated with my lovely wife.
• I’m thankful for the technology that lets me see (and speak to) my grandchildren.
• I’m thankful to be a part of a community that cares for its neighbors.
• I’m thankful that my sons are grown because virtual learning seems... difficult.   
• I’m thankful that nature carries on despite the shutdown.
• I’m thankful that the sun shines bright every day
• I'm thankful that the waves still crash on the beach.
• I'm thankful that there's a new wild foal roaming the Outer Banks.
• I’m thankful that pizza delivery never skipped a beat.
• I’m thankful for my wife’s ability to cook.
• I’m thankful for bike rides that burn off all those extra pasta calories.
• I’m thankful that I have never had the urge to bake sourdough bread.
• I'm thankful that I've never shared photos of any sort of bread on social media.
• I’m thankful that I can finally admit that I’ve been lying to myself when I said “I’d read more classic literature if I only had more free time.” Those books are never getting read... and I'm okay with that.

So what happens now?

Many parts of the country are taking baby steps to get back to normal. 

Here in Currituck County, we’re waiting for the governor’s Stay at Home order to end (as of right now) on May 8th. Fingers crossed, we can welcome visitors before the end of May.  

But nobody knows for sure what happens next. The best we can do is prepare for the worst and hope for the best.

In the meantime, please reach out if you have questions or need anything at all.

You can call me at (252) 232-6015 (or just respond to this email).

I'll be home with my laptop and phone at the ready.

You'll actually be doing me a favor because the more time I spend helping people, the less time I spend thinking about that leftover lasagna.

Take care of yourself, take care of others and thanks for reading!

Sincerely,

Larry Lombardi
Director of Economic Development