It's not easy being a dinner keynote speaker. Clinking silverware. Waitstaff doing their thing. Mealtime conversations. You know, general distractions from the matter at hand everywhere you turn.
But tell Randy Pierce that’s a tough gig, and you’re likely to get an ironic laugh from the man who knows a little something about tough gigs, having gone from fully sighted to fully blind in a matter of two weeks some 20 years ago.
Since then, Pierce has been defined by what he can do, not what he can’t, and the list is long. He has hiked New Hampshire’s 48 4,000-foot peaks twice – once in a single winter season, once in a single summer; completed the Boston Marathon twice; summited Mount Kilimanjaro; hiked the Andes Mountains to reach Rainbow Mountain in Peru; and, perhaps most remarkably, completed two Tough Mudder obstacle races.
So a dinner keynote? Not too big a deal.
Pierce brought his message of “Vision Beyond Sight” to the installation ceremony of 2019 NHAR President Dan O’Halloran, and you’ve never heard a room full of 80 Realtors get, and stay, so quiet during a meal.
“As he said, you don’t need to be able to see to have vision,” O’Halloran said. “It was an incredible message of breaking down our self-imposed limits.”
The event was emceed by Strafford County Board President Nate Dickey, and in addition to the keynote, past NHAR President and former NAR Treasurer Tom Riley presented outgoing NHAR President Gerry O’Connell with a gift from NAR President Elizabeth Mendenhall, and Past President Alan DeStefano was the installing officer for both O’Halloran and the 2019 NHAR executive committee.
The executive committee includes President-Elect Marc Drapeau, First Vice President Jim Lee, Second Vice President Dick Dumez, Secretary Paul Griffin, Treasurer Ben Cushing, O’Connell as Immediate Past President; committee chairs Adam Gaudet (communications), Marion Cheney (legal), Kathy DeMello (professional development) and Mary Truell (public policy), and member liaisons Cheney, DeStefano, Richard Gowen and Steve White.