The reason Walt Merrell started writing stories will break your heart (2024)

In 2015, Walt Merrell was racing against time. After finding a lump in the corner of his eye that was diagnosed as terminal sarcoma, he was given two years to live.

“I had two years to tell them everything, a lifetime of information,” he says – by “them,” he means his three daughters. He had a lot he wanted to say to Bay, Cape and Banks, who were then 8, 5 and a toddler. Preserving the many stories and bits of wisdom he wanted them to remember was going to be his “going-away gift” to them.

He wrote furiously, while balancing a demanding job as the district attorney of Covington County, a position he has held since 2010, as well as his commitment to his family. He didn’t want to miss any time with his wife and children in the process of documenting the things he so desperately wanted them to know.

Walt underwent two surgeries by two of the top ocular surgeons in the world, and then a miracle happened. “They could no longer confirm it was cancer,” he says. “By the grace of God, I’m still alive.” He still has an annual MRI, but he is healed, his cancer diagnosis reversed.

Meanwhile, he had written thousands of words that he wasn’t quite sure what to do with. “‘Shepherding Outdoors was kind of a consequence,” he says.

Shepherding Outdoors became his “brand.” Eventually, he would turn those stories, and more he has written since, into a series of three books. The first two books, “Shepherding Outdoors” and “Shepherding Outdoors Volume 2,” are sold out. A third, “Shepherding Outdoors – Dog Days: A Collection of Short Stories from a Southern Father,” is coming out this fall.

His Shepherding Outdoors Facebook page, where he shares stories, family photos and occasional “live” talks, has 270,000 followers. He also shares content on Instagram, YouTube and his website.

‘A great place to be’

Walt, his wife, Hannah, and their three daughters live in Andalusia, Alabama, in a home built by Hannah’s late father, George Gantt. Her mother, Brenda, who became Facebook-famous during the Covid-19 pandemic with her Cooking with Brenda Gantt page, lives nearby.

“When she published her first video, I had 20,000 loyal, faithful followers on Shepherding Outdoors,” Walt says. “Then she explodes.” Brenda now has some 3.5 million followers on Cooking with Brenda Gantt.

“But a rising tide raises all ships,” he says, without a hint of jealousy or competitiveness. “She’s the star of the show. I’m quite content in the background writing my little stories.”

Walt was born in Mobile and grew up in Fairhope. His parents divorced when he was 9 years old, and he became the first person in his family to graduate from high school. A “wayward soul,” he was completely lost when it came to deciding on a college to attend, so he followed a student who graduated a year ahead of him to the University of Montevallo. The college ended up shaping his future in more ways than one.

“The small environment allowed me to build relationships with mentors,” he says. “It helped me find myself – and Hannah.”

He had long hair back then and favored cut-off shorts, tie-dyed shirts and “Jesus sandals.” Hannah asked him out on their first date, and he jokes that she might have chosen him purposely to scare her parents. But they didn’t scare easily and loved him as one of their own. (And his hair is still a little longish because Hannah likes it that way.)

After graduating from law school at Samford University’s Cumberland School of Law, Walt had five job offers, “all almost identical,” he says, except for the location. He took a position in Hannah’s hometown of Andalusia, which he says was “probably the best decision I ever made, second to marrying her.” The charming small town in south-central Alabama “is a great place to be and exist and practice law,” he says.

Living so close to his in-laws has been a blessing in Walt’s life. “When Hannah and I got married, I didn’t know how to be a husband or father,” he says. “Her daddy took me under his wing and taught me so much about life and being a man. Her mother taught me equally important lessons about being a father to three daughters.”

A family ministry

Walt describes writing as a hobby and a “family ministry.” It’s also a therapeutic practice for a hard-working district attorney who witnesses some of the worst of humanity in his daily work. “In the morning, I might be staring at a dead body, and that afternoon I’m talking to an 8-year-old who’s been raped by her father,” he says. “Hope through faith keeps me going.”

His writing focuses on “positive, encouraging, uplifting things,” he says. “I’m just a regular guy God gifted with the ability to tell stories, and I try to share them,” he says. His writing style is often humorous and self-deprecating, but he always includes “an uplifting message,” he says.

Around the time he started Shepherding Outdoors in 2017, he felt he was “losing his influence” on his daughters, he says. But he realized they all liked to be outside, doing things like kayaking, fishing, hunting, hiking and camping. “We found our common ground,” he says. “Our relationship found a new level because we went outside together.”

Like the first two volumes, his new book, “Three Dog Days,” encourages parents to get outside and have adventures with their children. This time, he focuses on the transition he went through when his first child went to college. If the stories have a constant, he says it’s that first you’ve got to try, and second you must have faith that what you’re trying will work.

He insists he’s not an expert on anything except being willing to try – like when he borrowed a tent for the family’s first camping trip and spent a frustrating 30 minutes trying to set it up. Finally, Bay surprised him when she said, “I’m really impressed, Daddy.” No, he wasn’t a camping expert at the time, but neither was she – and he was there, making the effort.

“They just want me to try,” he says. “Sometimes I try and fail.” The expectation that parents need to be experts is “unrealistic,” he says.

Walt wakes up by 5 a.m. every day to write for an hour and a half or so while everyone else in the family is asleep – that way, he doesn’t miss out on any time with Hannah and their daughters.

He credits his mother with encouraging him to jot down his thoughts, feelings and memories when he was 13 years old. He was helping some family friends on Dog Island in Florida after Hurricane Elena hit, and she gave him a spiral notebook and a pen and told him to start keeping a journal.

“I still have it,” he says. “That was the bud that bloomed.”

To pre-order Walt Merrell’s new book, “Shepherding Outdoors – Dog Days: A Collection of Short Stories from a Southern Father,” visit shepherdingbook.com or call (800) 361-8059.