Sophia's Song
Elite angler Steve Kennedy celebrating first Father's Day
By Don Barone- "I got my face pressed up against the nursery glass
She's sleeping like a rock
My name on her wrist wearing tiny pink socks ... "
Date: Father's Day
You take the measure of a man not by what he brings, but by what he leaves behind.
And there is nothing, nothing we leave behind more important than our children.
Our children are our gift to mankind.
And what we give them is our gift to their future.
My father's gift to me: a sense of humor, and a gentle touch.
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It's the one present I have been able to open every day of my life. The giver is gone; the gift is not.
Every day of my life has been changed since the birth of our children. Thoughts of me turned to thoughts of them. In fact, they are the only part of me that I think about, the only part of me that matters.
And now my babies are adults. To most, but not to me.
My children laugh, and they are caring and kind. And they will bring me gifts this Father's Day, but not the gift I really want.
What I want for Father's Day is to unwrap time.
I want to go back and sit in a rocking chair and hold my babies in my lap. To watch their first smile, to hear their first sounds, to have that tiny head once again rest on my shoulder, to walk into the "baby's room" and have my son or daughter standing up in the crib, toothless grin smiling at me.
Nothing in life prepares you for those moments; nothing in life prepares you for when those moments are gone.
Which is why I'm extremely jealous of Bassmaster Elite pro Steve Kennedy. Sunday is his first Father's Day.
Trust me, new dads, when I say that this day, this once-in-a-lifetime day for you, is a treasure from the universe, and if you believe, a gift from a father who is kind, with a gentle touch and a very good sense of humor.
Sophia Mae
So-So. That's Sophia Mae Kennedy's nickname.
A 7-month-old baby girl named after Steve's grandmother, Gladys Mae Sprayberry Kennedy. A 93-year-old lady who was killed in a car wreck a couple of years ago as she was driving herself to get a pedicure.
So-So, you have in your genes the stuff of legends.
Born Oct. 30, 2008, on an Auburn University away weekend. The first Auburn University football game Sophia got to attend came a little later, when she was 9 days old, complete with tailgating. It was, after all, homecoming. Auburn won 37-20 over Tennessee-Martin.
And Sophia has been on the move ever since.
Sophia's travels: approximately 8,500 miles to date.
Out of the seven months she has been alive, Sophia has been home (one without wheels traveling the Bassmaster Tour) for three months.
Sophia has probably been to more places than you. She's been to Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Illinois, both Carolinas, Virginia, Iowa and Mississippi.
The language in her head must be one of waves. She is a child of the water. Seven months old, been to 11 lakes:
Alabama's Martin, Neely Henry, Wheeler and Guntersville; Toho and Okeechobee in Florida; Arkansas' Dardanelle, Virginia's Smith Mountain; Kentucky Lake in Tennessee; the Red River in Louisiana; and the Mississippi River in Iowa.
At one of those lakes, she won my heart.
With a wave. Sort of.
At a picnic table in a campground as I was going away, a tiny hand came up, the clinched fist opened up pretty much all the way, and everyone saw it and said, "Her first wave … to db?"
And I melted.
No wonder her father, Steve, has no chance.
Daddy
Steve Kennedy is Indiana Jones with a fishing pole and Auburn hat. A man who has never met anybody he hasn't talked to.
And born to fish.
"Steve Kennedy knows fish," says K-Pink, also a guy pretty familiar with bass. "He knows how fish think. He just gets it. Doesn't matter what kind of fish, you put him on water, and he'll catch it."
I can't vouch for the fish part, but I can vouch for the father part. This guy was made to be a dad.
Just ask those closest to him, those who would notice dad things, the wives of the Elite anglers.
K2 (Kerry Short): "It was always, how you say, a challenge to get Steve to pre-fish a tournament; now it's even harder, he'll just play with Sophia hours on end."
Steve: "Yep … before I was totally focused on fishing, now it's the baby. I'll spend 30 minutes to an hour in bed just playing with Sophia."
Tammy Cook: "He's become more clingy, and he spends hours on the Internet researching stuff to do with babies. It used to be fishing information, now it's what to feed a 7-month-old."
Steve: "Yep … what's wrong with that?"
K2: "He shows Sophia everything. He bends over holding her so she can feel the grass, the water, the dog, leaves. … Yesterday he even showed her a tick."
I saw it, he did -- didn't need to ask about that one.
At the tournament in Del Rio, Texas, on Lake Amistad, Steve came to the event alone, but Sophia was never far away.
K2: "It was raining and we were walking across the parking lot, and Steve comes running over saying, 'You have to see this,' and what he wanted to show us was this big book of photos of Sophia. No doubt he missed her. I think he showed everyone there that book."
"When Julia posted a video on her blog that showed Sophia holding her own baby bottle for the first time Steve sat there watching it, his first time seeing it, and as he was watching he kept saying, 'Go, baby girl; go, baby girl,' and couldn't believe it when she did it on her own."
Mommy about Daddy
I know I'm killing you, dude, but I talked to your wife about you.
Before the arrival of Sophia, you could make an argument -- a strong one -- that Steve had a one-track mind: fishing.
Julia: "My OB-GYN had this pond out behind his building, and while we were in his office, he asked us if we had any more questions about the birth and things, and of course I had several. … Steve had one. He looks at the doc and says, 'Next time can I bring a rod and fish that pond out back?'"
Whenever I see Steve, I think of the Mick Jagger song "Just My Imagination," and this specific lyric:
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"I tell you I am just a fellow with a one-track mind
Whatever it is I want, baby, I seek and I shall find."
Sophia changed all that.
Julia: "When we drive between tournaments with him driving the bus and me in the Jeep, he has to stop every two hours so he can come back and get some "baby love" from Sophia. … He can't go more than two hours without seeing the baby."
Remember love? If you don't, that's it right there.
Not being able to go without someone because that someone is a part of you, and without it you are not complete, is why the universe created love.
It's the particle that binds us, without it, we're just bubbles riding the waves.
I remember the exact moment I knew I had to do this story, and that this would be my Father's Day piece.
Day 2 weigh-in. Money day, bank day, check-writing day. The top 50 anglers make the cut and the money; the other half of the anglers go home without a dime.
Just a little tension in the air, huh. I was standing watching the leaderboard as the weigh-in happened. One by one, some pros would go above the money line, while others would drop below it. No. 50 stays, No. 51 goes home.
As I turned from the board to scan the crowd, I saw this beat-up Auburn hat -- Steve's -- but it was waist-high. I'm looking down at it, not up as I normally do.
When I followed the hat down, there's Steve, on one knee, with Sophia in some sort of baby papoose thing, and he's giving Sophia her baby bottle.
The universe got this one right.
Julia: "When he waits to see if he has made the top 50 or not he has to find her and he holds her while he waits, and after the weigh-in when I pick him and the boat up at the ramp, he will ride back home in the back seat with her."
You might not want to leave them alone, though. Steve, after all, is still Steve.
Julia: "We were in this restaurant, and as I was coming back to the table I hear all this laughter from him and Sophia, and when I get there I see that he has been sitting there teaching her how to stick her tongue out and do the Bronx cheer, and they are both just cracking up over it."
Julia just looks at me with the palms-up, head-shaking look that says it's quite possible she may have two kids on her hands.
She would be right.
Daddy about Daddy
Go get some scissors; I'll wait for ya.
I'm saying that because before Father's Day you're going to want to go to your computer, print out some sort of picture of a dad with a kid, and then use a glue stick to paste on these next two quotes from Steve.
Here's my questions. I'm getting out of the way of this, Steve's going to bring this story home -- start cutting.
Here's Steve on "When did you first feel like a Dad?"
Steve: "I can't define fatherhood in one moment. When I found out the baby was a girl, saw her heartbeat. Saw her yawn at the 3D ultrasound. Watching her be born. Holding her for the first time while she's sleeping. Now hearing her say 'Da-da' when she sees me. They all together stand out special to me, but there's just not just one 'first feel Dad' moment."
Yes, there is, and he just nailed it.
His final answer is why the universe allows us to procreate.
db: "What is your wish for Sophia?"
Steve Kennedy, on the treasure that is Daddy's first Father's Day:
"To have passion for something the way I have passion for fishing."
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"... She's got my nose, she's got her mama's eyes
My brand new baby girl
She's a miracle
I saw God today."
"I Saw God Today"
George Strait
To all the past, present, and future dads, happy Father's Day, and thank you.
-- db
Don Barone is an award-winning outdoor writer and a member of the New England Outdoor Writers Association and is also a member of the Outdoor Writers Guild of the U.K. You can reach db at www.donbaroneoutdoors.com
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