Profile: John Crowley

He's making a name as a conversation starter with events like the public Conversation Café and the private Literary Pub Crawl (which isn't about drinking).

October 19, 2005

Name: John Crowley

Age: 43

Family: “I’m married to a French woman, Anne-Laure Crowley. We’ve got two boys, Kian, 10, and Jeremy, 8. My brother Tim also lives here.”

Occupation: “I design and develop software for cruise line reservation systems for Datalex, an Irish company.”

Background: “I was born in Dublin. We lived for the first years of my life in Venezuela and America and France. My dad was a research chemist. We returned to Ireland when I was about six. He’s not a publican (pub owner). He’s a research chemist who was given a pub by his dad. He kind of did both. The pub is called the Magic Carpet, we have no idea why. It’s been in the family for 50, 60 years. I’ve been pulling pints since the age of 12 up until I was 22. If you own the pub you can work in it.”

When did you move to Petaluma? “My wife and I moved here 12 years ago from Frankfurt. I lived there for eight years prior to that. I guess in the ’70s and ’80s, and I suppose traditionally in Ireland, you got educated and you left. So that’s what I did in ’85. I went to Germany and spent eight years there and now I’m here since ’93. My brother was living in Petaluma, and we came to the United States on a vacation, and somebody offered me a job.”

Education: “I got a bachelor of computer science at UCD, University College Dublin.”

What do you like about Petaluma? “The community spirit here. That people know their neighbors. A lot more so than Miami, where I work sometimes. Everyone there seems to be scared of their neighbors, scared of each other. And here it’s just a nice place to live.”

What is your Literary Pub Crawl all about? “I started it about four years ago when my wife and kids were away in France. I was in on a Saturday night watching television. And I thought, ‘I don’t want to grow old watching television.’ So I phoned a bunch of my friends and said, why don’t we go out? And they didn’t have baby-sitters, so the whole spontaneity of being married with two kids essentially ties your hands to a certain degree. So if you want to go out and socialize, you’ve got to plan it in advance. So that was kind of the spark. So I sent an e-mail to all the people I knew in Petaluma, and said, why not meet up in these three restaurants or pubs or whatever, and everybody showed up. That was only 15 people back then, but now it’s I suppose 150 people.”

How often does it take place? “Every three months. Pubs have a bad name in America. They’re treated kind of like, you go into there just to get smashed or to pick somebody up or get picked up. They’re viewed completely different in other parts of the world, certainly in Ireland and England. They’re viewed there as more of a social center. People have meetings there. They go to meet their friends there. The go just to socialize, really. So what I’m trying to do is to re-create that a little bit, because there’s nothing wrong with it.

That’s why they’re called bars in America, because it’ kind of frowned upon.”

Where do you go and what happens? “They always have themes. A lot of it is centered around literature. The last theme was ‘Bring a book that changed your life, or had a big impact on you.’ And then find somebody else that would appreciate that book. Don’t just give it away to the first person you see. Have a conversation about it. Make sure that they’ll appreciate it, and then give them the book. Other themes have been ‘Bring an alternative publication.’ I ended up with a publication for Swiss people living abroad. It actually was interesting. Other themes are to wear red or wear a crazy hat or talk about what countries you’ve visited, or learn three sentences in a foreign language and try to use it that night. Mainly just to get conversations going. It gives people a way of connecting with other people. One of my goals is to set up multi-city pub crawls. So about six months ago, we had one running at the same time in Paris, Dublin, San Francisco, and Danville.”

Where has it been held? “We have been to Form3, Graziano’s, Kate and Doc’s, Volpi’s. Pretty much everywhere in town. I like to start it in a place that’s not a bar, because most people don’t like to walk into a bar by themselves. It’s back to that old, ‘bars are bad, pubs are bad.’ They’re not; they’re a social place. A lot of people will drink water. I rarely see people get too much to drink. It’s not about drinking. The difficult thing when you say to someone that you organize a pub crawl is that they immediately think of 24-year-olds getting smashed. Well, if you want to go do that — go do that at home or whatever. Not on my pub crawl.”

Is it a public event? “No, it’s a private event for me, my friends, and friends of friends.

I don’t want to say there’s a pub crawl and it’s open to all and sundry to come. It’s not like that.”

What other type of community involvement do you take part in? “I’m interested in rejuvenating the Moose Lodge, because it’s a wonderful organization, because it’s underutilized. I run a Conversation Café there. I don’t think we have enough conversations in America. We get a lot of input. You sit in front of the television, you’re pretty much told what to think, you read newspapers. But rarely do you have a conversation about something that matters, where you’re trying to put your point of view across, understand other people’s points of view, and have a truly open and honest conversation. So I started this Conversation Café at the Moose a couple of months ago, and it’s been wildly successful. It takes place every second Thursday of the month at the Moose Club starting at 7:30 p.m. You can find out about it by visiting www.aqus.com/cafe.”

What other hobbies do you have? “I’m a soccer coach and Valley Vista PTA president. I have a lunchtime club as well, and I’m also part of the French group in town.”

How would you describe yourself? “Easygoing, friendly, understanding.”

What would you consider your greatest accomplishment? “My greatest physical accomplishment would be climbing Mount Shasta.”

Who are your inspirations? “People who do things rather than expecting others to do things for them.”

What is your greatest challenge in life? “Time. There’s not enough hours in the day.”

What is your favorite food? “My wife makes poulet à la crème, chicken in cream sauce.”

What is your favorite movie? “Crash.”

What is your favorite book? “‘Blink,’ by Malcolm Gladwell. It’s about first impressions, how you come to conclusions in one-third of a second.”

What would people be surprised to know about you? “I suppose that I was the PTA president. It surprised me, too, that I became the PTA president.”

If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be? “I’d change television. I would make all television stations non-profit organizations. I think television is ostensibly a fascinating and excellent medium. But it is just being used as a form of mind control, to a degree, through advertising and infotainment, kind of news junk that isn’t really news at all. We disconnected our TV about eight or nine months ago.”

What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done? “I suppose bungee jumping. It’s the scariest thing I’ve ever done, and I’d never do it again.”

— Interview by Dane Golden