Age of Aquarius or Age of Rose?
Over a provocative — and funny — breakfast one recent, sun-stuffed morning Mr. Rose was sounding — and feeling — frisky. Quickly, he corrected the casual assessment. Over dinner, over lunch, over brunch, over a daylight nosh, a mid-evening nosh, over a middle of the night nosh, whether the moon is shining, snow is falling or the sun is in eclipse, the City Councilman said that he always feels tigerish. Noting that last week his friend and City Council colleague, the Vice Mayor Alan Corlin, had been labeled Culver City’s most eligible bachelor in mid-life, Mr. Rose wondered where he qualified — like why wasn’t he at the top of the list? A bachelor (“this time,” he interjected) for the past decade, the Councilman, known for dating out-of-town ladies, was asked if he is presently on the market, as of the first month of summer? With a serious birthday looming, the question seemed timely. He chuckled. Then came an extended pause, the length of some peoples’ marriages. “Nearly everybody who is single is on the market,” Mr. Rose said. “But I don’t know how one scores eligibility. I guess that is a perception issue. In real estate, it is location, location, location. In the human flesh market, I don’t know what determines eligibility. Is it movie star status? Looks’ status? I think of myself as an eligible bachelor. If you didn’t, you would hold yourself in very low esteem.”
Going Like 60
How does the City Councilman feel about one more venture down the aisle that hopefully would not, this time, turn into a roundtrip ticket? Turning philosophical as his life elevates to a fresh, untried plateau, Mr. Rose said, snappily, “Sixty is the new 40. You figure out the rest,” followed by another hearty laugh. “I don’t know if it is time for a change in my status,” the Bald Is Beautiful bachelor said. Is it on his mind? “Not as a driving force,” Mr. Rose said. “If she walks through the door and I go head over heels, the possibility is not off the table. But it is not necessarily a priority.”
Uncle Sam Over His Shoulder
Love at 60, he said, is different from love at 18 in ways that previous generations did not have to worry about because persons are living longer today. ”Because of government regulations,” Mr. Rose said, “old perceived notions, marriage at the New 40 might take different forms than when you were at the Old 10. The government has set up the age of 65 — for me now, 67 — as the new full retirement age, does it then become a fiscal-oriented discussion of whether giving the government fees for a marriage license is proper? Or do you accept a long-term relationship as more realistic? A lot of people have chosen that way. Many seniors are living in long-term relationships. They specifically do not get married because it would affect their Social Security benefits, and affect the commingling of funds that eventually will go to their children. A lot of thought has to go into marriage at a senior age vs. a young couple who are going to build a life together.”
It Is All in Whose Mind?
Six weeks before his 60th birthday, Mr. Rose said emphatically, “I do not think of myself as a senior citizen. The government seems to want to categorize me as a senior citizen. As a practical joke, when I turned 40, somebody signed me up for AARP, and I have been receiving AARP literature for years. It is harder getting off the AARP mailing list than it is getting into the L.A. Times obituary section.” As one of Culver City’s highest profile civic/political figures, how has this standing affected Mr. Rose’s personal life? “A two-edged sword,” he said. “I find some people are more impressed with the title than they are with the person. I try to live by Rose’s Rules. It is considered unprofessional — illegal in some places — to date an employee. I write off any city employee. In my profession, in 20 years, I only dated two employees of Chamber members,” said the longtime professional President of the Chamber of Commerce. “I never have dated a Chamber member because it is an issue. I date women who live outside of Culver City.”
Speaking of Personal Ads…
What would it take, Mr. Rose was asked, to change his status from bachelor to married man? Ever the practical person, Mr. Rose said “I don’t know if there are qualifications when you are talking about spending the rest of your life with someone. Because of where I am in life, I would ask, for example, ‘Do you want to start raising a second family?’ Probably not. Do you want to become an adoptive grandfather? Adoptive father? What are the relationships with the other family? A lot of things are going on? How do you decide where to live? If one person has a house one place and you have a house somewhere else, how do you decide? What are your goals? Do you want to work the rest of life and never travel? Are you a workaholic? Do you want to marry someone who never wants to travel?” Mr. Rose’s answer falls somewhere in between. He said he would like to contract out as what is called a “range rider. Go into different Chambers of Commerce when the exec leaves, and serve there while they are searching for a month or two for a permanent replacement.”
Gazing Down the Street
Peering further into his future, Mr. Rose asks himself whether there are “other fun senior jobs that combine the work with travel.” And then he became deadly serious.”Society will not treat seniors tomorrow the way they treat them today,” Mr. Rose said. “It is said that the baby boomer generation changed America. I am on the leading edge of baby boomers (born in 1946). Baby boomers are entering their 60s. Are they going to be content with being cooped up in a Senior Center at the corner of Overland and Culver? Aren’t they going to be a lot more active? Baby boomers have been trained on the internet. The world has opened up to them. Those kinds of changes are happening. With the cost of housing, are two-generation families going to become more prevalent? Changes are going to happen. We just have to figure out where. I want to help shape the changes. I am not going to be content to sit back and let people tell me where I need to be.”
Explaining His Vote
As if some proponents would forget, Mr. Rose said that during his first term on the City Council, he was the only member who voted against the Senior Center. “I did it for a number of reasons,” he said. “One was basic economics, that because of certain loans that were obtained, the cost of maintaining was going to be exorbitant for the city’s General Fund. Secondly, I really questioned four years ago how much longer a traditional Senior Center was going to be effective. I think the wave of seniors I belong to is going to turn its back on the Senior Center. The members of my generation have lived their own lives. They have changed the rules. What makes the government and some people think they can coop us up when we get older?”