Short Story
Hello my name is Justin Gentry. I was born in August 1998. I’ve always loved capturing pictures of nature and watching all kinds of wildlife shows on TV. My grandpa and I use to hunt and fish all the time as I grew up. I spent most my life adventuring in the woods. My wife and I met in 2017 and she was starting on her little photography gig and she slowly drew me into it. She started doing weddings and I started helping her and began learning my camera and the equipment as the years went on. We got married in March 2022 and had our beautiful son in April 2024. In October 2024, my grandpa passed away. To say it took a toll on me would be an understatement. I got to where I didn’t want to get up in the mornings. The only reason I did was because of my beautiful wife and son. I tried to go hunting and couldn't get peace from it like I had in the past. So I bought a really nice lens for my camera, took it out of the box, and went to the woods. A beautiful doe walked out before I got the lens on the camera. I snapped a few pictures and just had that joy come over me again from taking that one picture of a deer. I knew from that moment I wanted to start taking pictures of nature and wildlife. I’ve had it in the back of my head for years but it hit me then and I fell in love with it. After that I talked with my wife and she loved the idea of me taking pictures and was on board. She tricked me and made me fall right into her trap. That’s what she wanted all along. All jokes aside, I did fall in love with it and fell in love with nature all over again. There is just something about being out in nature that calms the soul. In my photos, I hope it shows people out there that there is so much to see out in nature if we just open our eyes and get out there and walk around for a little while. Not only do you get to see the beauty in this world but you get fresh air and it calms the soul. When life is going a million miles a minute, we can stop and look around. Life’s too short not to enjoy the small things. There was a saying I heard and it simply said, “God where AREN’T you?” And it hit me like a ton of bricks. God is everywhere and I like to see His beautiful creation in nature and wildlife.
