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By Dan O'Sullivan
Like Anna and I, Karen Dempsey has been in the writing business for quite awhile. Unlike us, she has devoted much of her career to a worthwhile cause (domestic violence).
Fortunately, Karen doesn't rub her higher ideals in our faces. And in what we assume is the crowning achievement of her career, she has earned a place as one of The Hired Pens' star writers.
Before becoming a Pen, Karen did all kinds of great stuff, from authoring parenting articles for Brain Child magazine to working for the U.S. Department of Justice's National Center for Victims of Crime. Along the way, she also found time to get married and have two children, Brennan (5) and Liddy (4).
THP: Did you grow up around here?
KD: I did, in Buffalo.
THP: We're in Somerville, Massachusetts. I wouldn't call that "around here."
KD: I stand corrected.
THP: Is everything they say about Buffalo true?
KD: Yes, at least when it comes to the weather. The first time I brought my husband John there, we got nine feet of snow in three days.
THP: What brought you to Greater Boston in the first place?
KD: I went to Boston College.
THP: Is that because you couldn't get into the College of the Holy Cross?
KD: Where? Never heard of it.
THP: What got you into writing essays about your parenting experiences?
KD: I always wanted to write my own stuff, and I had done some personal essays earlier in my career. So it was something that was percolating for awhile and that I dipped in to when I could. Then, in 1998, I took some classes at the Johns Hopkins graduate writing program.
When I became a parent, there was this incredibly rich material to write about. And parenting can be such a solitary existence at times, so writing was a great way to connect with people, put my experiences out there and hear from others about their experiences.
THP: When it comes to parenting writing, there must be a lot of hot-button topics. Have any of your articles received a particularly strong response?
KD: I wrote this piece for Babble.com about getting uncertain results via prenatal testing. Due to the sensitivity of the issue, I was uncertain about posting the article. But then I got these amazingly warm and generous emails from people who had had a whole range of experiences with prenatal testing. It was a great way to connect with all these people who I'll never get a chance to meet.
THP: Do you have any bad habits as a freelancer?
KD: Well, I do think the best writing happens under pressure. When I was working in the Princeton Review offices, we'd all sit around throwing paper airplanes at each other, reading The Onion. And then somehow we'd come up with something great once crunch time hit. When things get the most intense, that tends to inspire my best work. Which is good for me, because my schedule is so erratic anyway.
THP: Do you like living and working in a creative area like Davis Square?
KD: I love it. Sometimes when I'm under an intense deadline, I like going to one of the local coffee shops. There are a lot of writers, a lot of creative thinkers. It's good being around that because it gives me a positive energy, even if it's just in my imagination. And the workers in the coffee shops are nice to interact with, too.
THP: Well, they're probably unemployed writers ...
KD: Exactly.
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