Last Nash: Leaving Nashville & Practicing Reckless Optimism

Place has always been everything to Kimble — until it wasn't. In Episode 2, she shares the story of leaving Nashville after 25 years: the house she and Boz never got to renovate, the two-year punch list that followed, and the Last Nash Tour she threw herself to close that chapter.

Plus: what reckless optimism actually means — and why she refuses to stop practicing it.

In this episode:

• The Nashville home Kimble and Boz never got to renovate — and why it was time to go
• Two years of clearing, fixing, and making the space fabulous — and why fabulous still wasn't enough
• The Last Nash Tour: a deliberate send-off of 25 years in Music City

Transcript

Place and space, have always been really important to me. At about six years old, I started redecorating my room as often as my mood changed, which was often. I recall over the years the stuffed animal sanctuary, the Rainbow Room, the bunk bed preteen den, the Tiger Beat poster palace, the Laura Ashley chintz chapel, and the mid-mod masterpiece.

Those were my spaces.

When I was eight or somewhere around there, I declared that I would be moving to Dallas to live with my father. If that lasted about a week or two, Dallas, it turns out, was not my place. I chose the college I would attend by asking my college counselor what looks and acts the most like Rice University, but is 500 miles away from Houston?

Vanderbilt.

No real backup, no money. I had to write my way into that place. It worked.

All this to get to you. So it is no surprise that after my husband died, suddenly. The place we made together in Nashville was a hard place to stay. The approval on the construction loan for the house that we were two weeks away from renovating into this dream home.

Magically fell apart when he died, even though nothing changed about the income coming in. We owned a business together. It still made the same amount of money. There was just one person on the paperwork. Not two.

Unfair. Maybe, but here's what reckless optimism came into play. Maybe this was for the best.

Maybe the house he started to die in wasn't really my place anymore. Now, when someone dies, those closest to you have a lot of advice. Some was good, some was bad, some was great. One of the greats was, don't make any huge decisions, for the first year.

I decided to sit with the choice of space for at least a year After-Boz.

I called on some old friends and resources from my house flipping days, and I made some new ones. The major reno was necessarily on pause because of the bank. But I could make some small changes to fix the things I had hated about my current space and possibly have the house ready to sell if I decided that wasn't enough.

So, set and break down your goal, step one, to the goal of remove the things that I can't live with. This was easy. There were so many people who wanted to pitch in and help After-Boz. They wanted to do something.

And I really needed help.

I was never going to use the fully functioning brewery that we had built upstairs, or the fridge that the keg sat in. But I was also not gonna be able to get it downstairs. That's where the guys I affectionately call, The Soccer Boys came in. One phone call. One day. They dismantled everything, put it on the porch, took pictures, listed it for sale, and within a week it was gone.

It took about a month to clear out the rest of the stuff. That I knew I wasn't gonna keep. People said I was going a little too fast.

But I was pretty deliberate in choosing what would stay and what would go. I was pretty sure I was never gonna wear 25 Hawaiian shirts. I also thought they would make a great party favor for all the friends that wanted to come celebrate Boz at his wake.

And so no regrets. I gave them away.

Progress was made on the space. The biggest progress on the space actually came checking off one of the fucket list items that Boz and I had planned together. I mentioned that I'm writing a book. I thought it was written a year before Boz died, but the interested publishers said it was too short, and so.

I did what I do. I came home, I told Boz and I broke down crying and he looked at me with this stern look and said, who are you and what have you done with my wife? You are the fucking poster child for unstoppable. You will come up, with a way, to fix this.

And so we hatched a plan. We had achieved most of our goals.

We would rewrite those goals into this fucket list, and one of the first things on that list was The Home Edit. We binge watched those magical space, organizer geniuses for the entire pandemic. We even tried some of their techniques ourself.

Nope.

We turns out we're not nearly as good as they were. So a phone call and a check later while I was out of town.

I had The Home Edit, reorganize his pantry, into my pantry, his office, into my office. At the same time I closed down our office across town. Now, we had been planning on that list to close that office down too. The employees during the pandemic, far preferred working from home and, right after Boz died, the decision became really easy when my largest customer sent me a letter terminating our contract, so I no longer needed the warehouse space that was a part of that place.

And so that was closed down, the extra car was sold, all of those things that I could, live without, I removed over that first year.

Now you should know I am Gen X, and if you know anything about Gen X, you know we fucking love a list. So while all this was going on. I called back on my flipping days and I built the mother of all punch lists.

I made sure that I was gonna fix. At the cheapest rate that I could with the most help from my friends, streamlining the garden, getting a house paired down to sell, fixing the ac, remodeling the master bath, putting in a new countertop in the kitchen to replace the cracked marble one that was there. And over that first two years After-Boz I chipped away at that punch list until everything, was fabulous.

I used 0% financing over time. I researched and planned welcome distractions from the pain of losing my best friend and my husband, and that space became more than just livable. It became fabulous, but not fabulous enough. If it were possible to stay, I did everything I could, but everything I could was not enough. 



You may not know this, but our girl, Proforma Petunia, world famous social media maven mascot, also practices reckless optimism. I jump in puddles. She plays in the cold, but she likes comfy even on the feet. So one of her picks, and I'm gonna share this in a little bit of a, I don't know, Mr. Rogers moment...

..is the Komfi Sherpa, Nope slippers that the Kanata Group was nice enough to brand for her and send in my size. So these are, the definition of comfy.

When you slip these on, you are equipped with your solid soles that don't wear out your Sherpa lining, your suede uppers, conveniently emblazoned with the Nope logo for both indoors.

You are ready to play in the cold.

These particular Komfi Sherpa slippers have even made it to the airport. Now, I highly recommend if you're gonna wear them to the airport, 'cause you never know when you're gonna have to slide off your shoes about 80% of the time. That still happens in airports. I'm not sure why, some do, some don't. They all look like they have similar equipment.

I'm certainly not sneaking anything in the plane in these. I do wear socks with them when I take them to the airport 'cause I do not wanna be stepping on that airport floor when I have to put these through the scanner in my bare feet. Nor do I want when I slip these off on the plane. To offend the people around me because there is nothing grosser than the person next to you that slides off their shoes in the middle of a flight to expose their stinky feet.

Nope, that's not it.

But these guys go anywhere with me. I want them to go in the cold weather. Whether it's coffee on the porch, whether it's a trip through security with ease and comfort, or whether it's a nine hour flight, somewhere to live my best life. So thank you.

Our girl, Proforma Petunia, world famous social media maven mascot. For this, the Komfi Sherpa Petunia's Pick.

I appreciate you more than you'll ever know.

Space was bigger than just the house, the office, the car, the yard. Space was also the town that I live in. At least it used to be a town. It was becoming more city, less community, more tourist, less local, more chain, less proprietor. I tune into space. This song was starting to sound off key. The music was fading for me in Music City.

I heard that loud and clear over the first year After-Boz, the sound got louder and louder. I spent less and less time in that town. The fucket list was in full swing. I was sure I wanted to pick four cities in Europe and lived three months in each of them the following year.

And so I did some traveling.

To many more than four cities to choose the four that I wanted.

I even picked the places. Nice. France, Ischia Italy. Nazare, Portugal, and Valencia, Spain. And then as I was making my plans to move, I came to the realization that I would be leaving behind my mother.

Nope.

She turned out to be my place for now.

And so we made plans to move to the coast. Together. The nearest big town to the sleepy coastal town that Boz and I had planned on retirement was a place we chose.

Wilmington, North Carolina.

The pieces of that move fell into place as if we were being pushed out of Nashville. Both of our houses had contracts within the first week. We sold them and closed on our new house in North Carolina at exactly the same time to fund everything.

Change is scary.

And this was a big, bold move. 

There would be a lot I'd miss in Nashville, and so I hatched The Last Nash tour plan. I would send off the Nashville era the past 25 years. By celebrating the people and the places I loved, I would take in all the new things I couldn't miss before I left.

Last Nash included a mocktails tour of the three bars I didn't wanna leave behind Otto's, Mother's Ruin, and Husk.

It included dining around town at Folk, Pastis, and of course Prince's Hot Chicken.

And it included the mother of all going away parties, on the same day that 600 of my colleagues were arriving from all over the country. 40 of my favorite customers breweries were having a brew festival. When I was agonizing over how to get all my people together a month prior, my customer who created the event, handed me a discount code and offered up the festival as a going away party.

Priceless.

Those last precious moments with friends, family, customers, colleagues. Were a great wrap to Nashville.

And the next stop was North Carolina.

Now North Carolina from Nashville is a nine and a half hour drive that would require a hella playlist. You can find that list on Spotify. It's called The Last Nash Tour. It starts when I started in Nashville in college with Dash Rip Rock. Todd Snider, Tall Paul. It winds through the years with all the local bands, all the local concerts that I wanted to send me off.

Will Hoge, Elvis Costello, Sixpence None the Richer, The Mavericks.

Some were there, some just came there for an event and created a memory. And then the list winds through the states on the way. Until we pull up to the coastal North Carolina area, the bands change and so does the vibe from country through mountains to coastal. 

That playlist embraces change, encourages brave, bold moves.



You should check it out. 



Petunia asked me to come and show off one more thing that she got from SanMar.

Lemme tell him a little bit about this one, will you Petunia.

This one is an Eddie Bauer poncho, that is also a blanket that, in my world, might be the thing that keeps me alive through the winter.

This, is puffy and warm and comfortable. Mm-hmm. It packs up very small. It would be really nice, I think, in your car trunk for when you're out cold places and you've really gotta cover up. I can tell you my husband coached soccer for a lot of years and I used to have to go to the games and be the loving wife on the sidelines in whatever weather.

I can tell you a couple of games where this thing would've come in. Really handy. It's got a selfhood. Got these little arm holder things here.

Nothing is getting under this. I am so happy in this thing. I might just spend a majority of the rest of the cold nights of the winter in this. It's something really special, and this is a perfect example of that kind of unique corporate apparel gift or a corporate apparel offering that your employees are just not gonna think of on their own.

But boy, once they have it, it elevates your brand to a whole new level.

This is quite good, Petunia, I think you've outdone yourself on your Petunia Picks this time. The Eddie Bauer puffy poncho is one of my favorite things you've ever picked out for us, and that's saying a lot 'cause you have extremely good taste.

So well done, Petunia. Well done on this pick. It's a winner.

Earlier I mentioned reckless optimism. I have a saying that I adopted after my friend Ashley Sheehan. Introduced me to it years ago.

Practice reckless optimism.

Practice because we'll never be perfect at optimism. It's just not a thing we're in tune with on a regular, but if you practice, you get a lot better at it.

I've been practicing for years. I forget when this first happened, but I'll tell you the story of what I remember. Ashley had this great store called Old Made Good. It was a combination of picking, upcycling, and straight up art, and I used to go in there when I was having a meh day and I would treat it like a museum.

And I would slowly walk through the space and look around and see all the offensive sayings, stencil to old plates, the harsh truth, embroidered, cross stitch, artwork. And, the artwork that was an old found piece from some pick that had these bright gold letters across it with a message that some of us need to hear.

On that day, I had brought some stuff for her and I was picking up some stuff for me, and on the wall was a two foot by three foot, faded landscape. One of those things you would've seen in your grandparents' house that they maybe got in the forties or fifties, that was just the Z Gallery art of the time. Totally canned, not even remotely original.

Nothing high-end about the frame. This would've ended up in landfill if anyone else, but Ashley had found it, but now it had the words across it slightly uncentered, not perfect.

Practice reckless optimism.

It hit me. I stared at this thing for so long and I looked back at Ashley and I said, man, this is me.

This is the thing I've been doing that I've been trying to explain to people for all these years. And she said, you know what? You're right. You should take that home. And so I did. And I had that picture in my office to remind me of reckless optimism for probably 10 years. And then there was a flood in my office.

It came from above, from some pipe upstairs in this leased space that I had. And that pressboard frame just couldn't handle the drip of water all weekend before we caught it the next Monday. And so this thing mostly disintegrated and my picture was gone, but that's okay because the message and the gift that she had given me stayed with me for a very long time.

So let me explain to you what I think reckless optimism is.

Now, if you wanna hear the technical definition, if there is one for reckless optimism. I did not make this up, so it's out there on the Google. You should look it. But for me, reckless optimism is what I've been telling people I've been doing for decades.

It started with. Someone coming to me and saying, you know what, when I grow up I wanna be just like you. And I said, well, there's your first mistake. 'cause I never grew up Reckless optimism is 10-year-old you. Reckless optimism is that kid that learns so much every single day. It's that kid that was curious and unafraid, questioned everything, learned so much, and just looked at the bright side.

When I was 10 years old, I jumped in puddles. That was one of my favorite things to do in the rain. A rainy day was not a day to sit inside and not play. A rainy day was a day to get the raincoat and the galoshes on and go outside and play in the puddles.

Practicing reckless optimism.

When something went horribly wrong, there had to be a bright side. Why did this happen? Well this happened because it frees you up for this thing. Reckless optimism is looking for the bright side.

Now, I frustrate my friends with reckless optimism 'cause I come across as contradictory.

For example, if you give me an example of a really bad day, I hear you.

I acknowledge that you feel like it is a very bad day. However, it is likely that I'm gonna try to share some contradictory way of looking at it that makes it maybe not seem so bad.

The rainbow at the end of the shower.

I've been doing this for years and it can get quite frustrating to people, I suppose 'cause I do end up upsetting my friends who maybe just wanna hear me say, well that's just shitty and let's sit with that for a minute. I don't want them to feel shitty. I want them to feel like there's some light at the end of this tunnel. I should know a little bit about light at the end of tunnels, so I will not stop practicing reckless optimism.

And I hope that you don't either. I hope that you can find that curiosity, that carefree that you had when you were 10 years old. 'cause it's a great way to look at things. 'cause bad stuff's gonna happen to all of us. And I've talked in the last episode plus this one about some pretty bad things.

But you know what?

We're here and we're doing this thing and I am not gonna get held back by a bad thing.

I believe in the power of nope. And nope. Saying no to the obstacles that try to set you off of your path to whatever it is that your goal is. I believe in setting and breaking down your goals, and I believe in saying nope to the distractions and that bad day is a distraction.

Nope, nope, nope. We are not gonna have that.

And that is why I practice reckless optimism.