Eldersex: Love Among the Ruined?

Remember when Tom Jones was the tackiest thing on two legs?

I realized I was way out of the mainstream in my taste in men when I saw all those women throwing underwear on stage. To me, Tom Jones was the epitome of sleaze. His big hits were some of the most reviled songs of my youth.

But then I had not seen Tom Jones in 1964, before Vegas got hold of him. Pretty hot, if you ask me.

Now, half a century later, he's releasing a brand-new album. "Praise & Blame" comes out on July 26. Believe it or not, Tom Jones is looking kind of hot again.

You see, I'm old. I'm very, very old. The fact that I'm even thinking about Tom Jones proves how old I am.


I won't be dying my hair or buying Botox shots, but I feel every year of this long life of mine.

How do you know you're old? Creepy old men don't look so creepy anymore. (If that fact alone doesn't creep you out, I don't know what will.) Don't forget to factor in any serious illnesses that will hasten your lunge towards the Geritol years. I had a doozy.

Middle-aged men and women are endlessly reinventing themselves. Why? Because they can! They don't remember all the stuff that used to embarrass them, and they figure everyone else has forgotten too. Likewise accomplishments. What's that you say? You were published in Gust o' Wind Journal? Sorry, never heard of it.

In old age, the value of all things gets renegotiated. Money comes in handy, but in the end we can't buy what we really want -- substitutes to take our place for the inevitable trip to the cemetery.

Companionship is a blessing, but a mixed one. "Don't you need someone to talk to?" a woman asked an elderly widower I know. "Nope," he replied. "And I don't need anyone to listen to either."

And that brings me to sex. One would assume interest in sex wanes with the sagging of skin and the thinning of hair. Apparently not.

At The Villages, a retirement community in Florida, STDs run rampant. Many of the residents came of age when pregnancy was a bigger problem than disease.

Taking a cue from their teenage counterparts, seniors are sexting. (Well, it's not like anyone can blackmail them or ruin their careers.) No doubt the appearance of Viagra on the scene has something to do with this cultural shift. Although the FDA recently scuttled a "lady Viagra" pill, I don't think we've heard the last of this.

However, it's not just about sex. In 2008 Andrew D. Blechman published a book on age-segregated communities, "Leisureville: Adventures in America's Retirement Utopias."

There was a time when senior citizens were content to play cards, take walks, golf, visit kids and grandkids, read, volunteer and travel, all the while aging in place. But that was back in the days of sidewalks, corner grocery stores and generous retirement packages.

And it was before the diaspora of extended families, not to mention a rise in violent crime, which peaked in the early 1990s. Today crime is going down, but it's still three times the rate of 1960.

The phenomenon of age segregation dates back to 1954. In Arizona, the planned community of Youngtown sprung out of 320 acres in the Maricopa County desert. The idea was that if you don't have to pay for schools, then you have the makings for a neighborhood where seniors could feel secure and live within their means.

Over time Youngtown changed, partly due to a legal challenge by a teenager living with his grandparents and partly due to wear and tear on a modest desert neighborhood. But already a newer retirement community, Sun City, had raised its silver head and taken up the slack.

Life in Sun City and its more luxurious first cousin, The Villages in central Florida, is a never-ending parade of golf, booze, parties, games, dancing, more booze, more parties and lots of sex.

There's even a reality show called "Sunset Daze," an original series that began running April 28 on WeTV. This program is shot in Sun City Grand. The website describes it as "a unique, first of its kind, documentary series about the dynamic, young-at-heart residents living in Surprise, Arizona, one of the world's largest retirement communities. Meet and fall in love with its full-tilt characters who are reconnecting with their youth."

Among the episode titles: "Love, Lassos, and Liver Spots." Watch a short clip, titled "The Flip." If that whets your appetite, you can catch six episodes on a July 28 "Sunset Daze" marathon.

The New York Times wrote that one resident stipulated only that she not come off as a "lunatic senior."

Too late. "Sunset Daze" . . . pushes just that button as it tries to hold its own in the boozy, oversexed reality TV genre. The first episode has commentary on vibrators and going "commando," slang for not wearing underpants.

If that shocks you, then you're not ready for the sex chapter of "Leisureville." An off-color joke at the local watering hole for The Villages involves a mouse tattoo, and that's all you're gettin' out of me.

The gender ratios at retirement communities do not favor women. For every bachelor in age-segregated communities, there are three to six available females. If the cause of this disparity was women outliving men, big deal. But the new residents of retirement villages keep getting younger.

Blechman reports in "Leisureville" that a growing problem is a generation gap between residents. Like an echo of the very first age-segregated community sacrificing schools for lower taxes, the frail 90-somethings don't want to pay for the amenities of the more active residents in their fifties.

And active they are. The Villages has its own bona-fide "Mr. Midnight." Fit and good-looking, he has his pick of single women. But if women don't want to be part of a harem, what do they do?

Some women might go outside the perimeter. The recent Time magazine story on "The Science of Cougar Sex" cites a new study that postulates: 1) as women age they become less fertile, and since their previous babies might have died, they need to do lots of copulating before all hope is lost; and 2) older women are more libidinous because they're more comfortable with their sexuality than younger women.

We needed a study to tell us this? Here's another theory for you: Maybe older women, well over their doormat phase (if they ever had one), at last possess the self-knowledge and chutzpah to make sure sex is a pleasurable event for both partners. Just a thought.

On a positive note, just as author Blechman predicted in his 2008 book, gay and lesbian retirement communities are increasing in number. We're here. We're queer. We're retiring.

But why stop at sexual preference? I could see my fellow baby boomers signing up for environmentally friendly developments with big trees, small vegetable gardens and central street markets like those in Europe and Asia.

While I like the concept of slow-moving golf carts and dedicated traffic lanes in gated retirement communities, I think adult tricycles and (for the infirm) rickshaws would go over even better with my generation.

Some might see the hedonistic residents of "Leisureville" as selfish and even a little repulsive. I admit I did, at first. But as Blechman's book drew to a close, I found myself giving these seniors credit for looking forward into an uncertain future with anticipation and excitement instead of dread.

Still, I can't see myself ever joining their ranks. But give me a safe, walkable neighborhood (within a retirement community, or not) and add to that a coffee shop, a giant library and a place to watch the sunset, and I'll overlook the unbalanced gender ratio. I'll even tolerate the New Age elderstudy groups that will sprout like weeds when the acid rockers finally retire. As long as I can keep a sweet Earth Mama by my side to care for me at the end, I'll be fine.