Parker Mortensen’s career has taken them from internships, contributing and staff writer positions, podcast host, arts critic, copy editor and communications coordinator. And now, most recently, it’s landed them in The Park Record’s newsroom.
While this wasn’t necessarily their “plan,” they said they’ve always loved to write.
“When I was growing up, I would write a lot. I would go home and I would just write,” they said, like short stories or personal essays. “I really enjoyed it, and I feel like it really helped me express myself early on. So I’ve always identified as a writer.”
They first had a story published at 16, after they’d spent a semester as a page in Washington, D.C., for the U.S. House of Representatives, the only student from Utah. After returning, their local newspaper asked them to write an op-ed about the experience.
Their personal blog later provided more opportunities to be published, they said, often writing essays about art and video games, one of their favorite activities while growing up as an only child in Brigham City, a small town north of Salt Lake.
“My parents bought me a Game Boy during a car trip to Disneyland when I was 3 or 4, and I was hooked since then,” they said. “As I got older and I started getting interested in writing, I would write about games.”
These personal essays caught the attention of a website called Gamer’s Guide to Life, and they contributed work to them for a while.
While attending Snow College, they wrote for the Sanpete Messenger as an intern. Then, to Salt Lake City for the University of Utah, they began writing for SLUG Magazine, which stands for the Salt Lake Underground, in 2016.
They worked for SLUG in various capacities until 2023, writing the magazine’s monthly arts feature, producing the SLUG Soundwaves podcast, serving as copy editor and eventually working as communications coordinator.
Writing is still Mortensen’s passion, but they’re looking forward to focusing more on copy editing with their new position at The Park Record.
“I think it’s hard to be a writer sometimes because you are really putting yourself out there. Your mistakes or your worldview become apparent or are out there for people to see, and it stays for some time,” they said. “This role is just a really good fit for where I’m at right now. … I’ve really come to appreciate editing a lot more than writing.”
To be a copy editor means to support others, they said.
“When you’re writing your own thing, you become blind to the problems with it, or it’s hard to see them, at least. And then when you look at someone else’s work, it’s so easy to see how it could be improved because you don’t have that attachment to it,” they said. “It’s really satisfying to be able to help other people really clarify and get to what they’re saying.”
Along with editing and writing, Mortensen has brought back the community calendar in the print newspaper and assisted in publishing briefs to the website.
After many years working in Salt Lake, they’re also excited to spend time exploring Park City.
“I had spent vacations here as a kid and seen it through a kid’s eyes,” they said. “There’s a lot of interesting tension in Park City between being a small town and being a vacation destination, and obviously things like the Olympics. I didn’t anticipate how dynamic of a place it would be.”