Too Young to Retire - The Retirement Alternatives Resource

Not the Retiring Type

LAURA MEADE KIRK Journal Staff Writer , February 20, 2005

After working 30 years as a social worker in New York state, Nancy Sarah was feeling burnt out. But she couldn't afford to quit work and retire. She didn't see herself as the "retired" type anyway; she was just ready to do something new.

She decided to pursue what had always been her dream: To live on Block Island, where she'd vacationed for years. So she sold her house in New York and a vacation condo she'd had on Block Island and bought a bed and breakfast there.

Sarah has been running The Sheffield House for the past four years, which allows her to live and work on Block Island. Meanwhile, she'd also launched another career: as a "life coach" to help others follow their dreams. In addition, she volunteers at the Adult Correctional Institutions in Warwick, helping women inmates identify and pursue their goals in life.

Now 62, she plans to work and volunteer indefinitely. After all, she said, she has 26 years left on her mortgage.

"I can't say that I'm making any money," Sarah said in a recent telephone interview. "... But I'm living here. I'm eating. I'm clothed. I have an opportunity to do a little bit of running around. And, I'm happy -- what more can any person want?"

SARAH IS AMONG A GROWING number of people who approach retirement age only to find they can't afford or don't want a traditional retirement. So they're launching new careers, going to school or volunteering their time and talent instead.

So they're not really "retired," said Howard Stone of East Greenwich, who co-authored the book Too Young To Retire with his wife, Marika. They're just contributing their time and talents in a different way.

THE STONES, WHO ALSO RUN a Web site called 2young2retire.com, say they believe the very notion of retirement is obsolete.

"Everyone is busy. No one is just not doing anything anymore," said Barbara Stevens, director of communications for the AARP in Rhode Island. In fact, that group used to be called the American Association of Retired Persons until they realized that most of their members were still working. Now, the group prefers to be known simply by the initials AARP.

A 2003 association survey found that 70 percent of people age 50 to 70 planned to keep working into their retirement years, and nearly half expected to work until age 70 or beyond.

Stevens said many people approaching retirement age find they haven't saved enough money for a typical retirement, including health benefits. "If you retire at 55, you've got another 30 years to live -- and it takes a lot of money to live 30 years," she said.

Others simply find retirement boring.

Arthur Mark, 74, of Narragansett, a college professor turned actor, is among those unwilling to sit still. "Many of us, whatever our age, have got to go on. Our minds are still there. We want to have the fun of learning new things and conquering new spaces. It's in us -- it's in all of us."

THAT'S NOT TO SAY RETIREMENT is dead, said Sara Rix, senior policy adviser for the AARP in Washington. "People are still, for the most part, retiring [from work] at 65."

But studies show that fewer people are taking early retirement, waiting instead for Social Security and Medicare benefits to kick in -- generally starting at age 62, Rix said. And lots of people are working well beyond that, knowing that each year of work will increase their monthly Social Security benefits when they do retire.

In fact, Rix said, the number of people ages 65 to 69 in the work force has increased significantly in the past 20 years -- from 18.4 percent in the work force back in 1984 to 27.7 percent in 2004.

Most of the seniors surveyed as to why they're still working cited money as the major factor, Rix said. But they also said they wanted to be productive and to remain physically or mentally active.

But people don't have to work at a paying job to stay active, and the AARP surveys don't show the number of people who are doing volunteer work or working at nonpaying jobs after retiring from the work force.

THE STONES, WHO ALSO RUN a Web site called 2young2retire.com, say they believe the very notion of retirement is obsolete.

Howard Stone said it's an "antiquated concept" that dates to the 1930s, when Social Security was invented in part to help move older workers out of the work force to make room for the next generation. Since then, he said, "It's become the American dream not to work anymore."

But the reality is people are living longer, healthier lives, he said. And many people find they want and need something to do besides golf and travel -- whether it's paid work or volunteering, Stone said.

They may want to do it on their terms - not putting in as many hours, for example, or working at an entirely different job to try something new, Stone said. But it's good to have something to do each day, he said. And society benefits from the experience these older workers bring to the workplace, the community or even within the family, caring for grandkids.

"We want the world to be a better place by having mature people be connected to something that's important to them," Stone said. "If we don't give people a choice, and they just go sliding down this slippery slope of full-time leisure, endless weekend, we're just going to lose so much of this talent, this good juice, to some gated community."

His own goal is to permanently retire the word retirement. For one thing, he said, it promotes age discrimination. "When you go to an interview for a volunteer [position] or part-time job and say, 'I'm retired,' you've just nailed yourself age-wise." But more important, he said, the word has simply outlived its usefulness.

The Stones are among those who eschew the idea of traditional retirement. Stone, 69, was in sales and publishing until about seven years ago, when he gave up his professional career to become a life coach and lecturer.

His wife, 62, had worked for a public relations agency and as a freelance writer, then went on to become a yoga instructor and a masseuse.

They'd tried the retirement life, buying a condo in Palm Springs, Calif., to test the waters by spending weeks and months there at a time. But after a couple of years, they realized they'd never be content to sit around.

Howard Stone decided that what he really wanted to do was to help other people his age figure out what they wanted to for the rest of their lives.

He and his wife initially launched their Web site to promote his coaching practice. "My goal was to help others in mid-life, to say there was an alternative to retirement," he said.

They got such great response to their Web site that they self- published their book, Too Young To Retire, two years ago. It received favorable reviews -- The New York Times called it "a little gem" -- and was republished by Plume last year.

It's a typical self-help book in many ways, offering suggestions to get readers thinking about what they'd like to do after finishing up their careers. Options include launching new careers, or going back to school, or creating a business from a hobby, or doing volunteer work.

They also list publications and Web sites to check out some ideas, including Monster.com's "100 Things To Do If You've Been Laid Off" (www.monster.com), volunteer sites from Foster Grandparents (www.seniorcorps.org), and the International Rescue Committee (www.theirc.org), which is dedicated to helping refugees get settled in this country.

It's not easy, the Stones write. But with a little planning -- especially when it comes to the financial aspects -- there are plenty of ways to remain active and even make money pursuing lifelong goals and dreams.

THE END OF A CAREER can be the perfect time for a new start, Stone said. His Web site touts several "true life" stories, such as that of a Hospice nurse who launched her own company selling a homemade condiment called "krelish," and a couple who gave up their jobs in sales and construction to become alpaca ranchers.

Closer to home, Deanna Conheeny Casey, 54, of Newport loved her job as an assistant vice president at MetLife Insurance. But when she was offered an early retirement package four years ago, she decided to try something entirely different -- actually, a bunch of different things.

She'd often toyed with the idea of owning a store, so she bought a Sears store in Middletown. After a year, she sold it and became an investment representative with Edward Jones, a financial planning service. It was interesting, she said, especially because she had to sell her services face-to-face. "I knocked on 742 doors in Newport. Not many people wanted to turn away a gray-haired lady, so at least they opened the door for me," she said.

But about a year later, she gave that up to care for her ailing father. And when he died shortly after that, she tried yet something else -- working as operations director for Fort Adams, a nonprofit agency.

She's been in charge of tours and the gift shop there for the past years, but she recently decided she's ready for something else. So she's moving on to become marketing director for Greenvale Vineyards in Portsmouth. She's looking forward to the challenge of working for a small business, and says she may eventually want to own another business of her own.

The only thing she isn't considering is retiring. Even with her retirement package from MetLife, she figures she can't realistically afford to retire for 10 to 15 years. But she doesn't want to, anyway.

"I certainly wouldn't mind having some time off, but I can't see having every day off," she said. "I enjoy travel and I enjoy the beach, but I also like going to work . . . . I just love the vibrancy of business and the different people that you meet."

The best part of working at this age, Casey said, is that she no longer works to support her family or pay the mortgage. So she has the freedom to choose the job she wants. "You still have to bring home the bread and butter . . . but you can do what you want to do."

THAT'S ARTHUR MARK'S TAKE on retirement, too.

His lifelong dream was to become an actor, and at age 63, he did.

Mark, who lives in Narragansett and is related to the Stones by marriage (his daughter is married to their son), said he'd wanted to be an actor ever since he was a child. He'd even studied acting while in college, while pursuing a teaching degree at what was then called Boston Teachers College (it's now the University of Massachusetts at Boston). After graduating in 1952, he moved to New York to work in theater and he was offered a summer position with the Williamstown Playhouse in western Massachusetts. Though he would have earned only about $60 for the entire summer, it would have been great for his acting resume. But he had to support his family. So he became a teacher instead.

He eventually became a professor at the University of Pennsylvania in East Stroudsburg. While there, in 1977, he created a national, not-for-profit organization called Business and Industry for the Arts in Education to get businesses involved in schools. He later was elected to the Royal Society of the Arts in London. But all the while, he harbored his dream of becoming a professional actor. And when he gave up teaching in 1989, it was time to pursue it. "I figured, it can't be too late. I see people my age on TV all the time. And I see people who are doing ads who are my age."

He enrolled in an actors training program to get him started. He also had an ally in the late Ruth Warrick, who was a star on the soap opera All My Children and who'd served on the board of Business and Industry for the Arts in Education. She helped him land a role on the soap opera, and soon he was appearing in print advertisements, television commercials, off-Broadway shows and about 40 films. One of his most prominent roles was on the television show Law and Order, where he played a grandfather who was a child molester.

He gave up acting about four years ago, when a heart attack resulted in open heart surgery. But at age 74, he's busy helping the Royal Society of the Arts sponsor a symposium in Providence this coming June and helping establish the society's first official chapter in America. His wife, Cecile, is busy with sports such as cross-country skiing and helping care for their grandkids.

They couldn't imagine a traditional retirement, Mark said. 'We just don't understand that. All of our friends, most of them anyway, went south or west to Arizona, or did other things -- bought a trailer and traveled everywhere. To me, that would be pure hell. I find no excitement in that. We travel -- we've traveled many places in the world -- but I can't wait to get back home and get back to work."

And there's no better time than "retirement" to do the work you've always wanted to do, Mark said. "Our childhood dreams, they never die. They're still with you. So when you finally get to a place where you're free, with time and space and money or whatever, you're able to do it."

* * *

Golden-year opportunities

Need some ideas for alternatives to traditional retirement?

Howard and Marika Stone, authors of Too Young To Retire, have a chapter called "101 Opportunities for the Open-Minded" -- everything from "ageless adventurer" (working on a riverboat) to yoga teacher. They also often include Web sites and phone numbers for more information. Here's a sampling:

* Baby or kid wrangler: Someone to manage children for photo shoots for ads and commercials.

* Caretaker: Professional house sitters, also known as property managers, get free board and sometimes can earn a salary, as well.

* Cruise ship lecturer: Professors and other experts are always in demand for cruise lines, as are aerobics instructors, musicians, yoga teachers and the like.

* Expert witness: If you've got job experience, you may find work as an expert witness in court hearings or legal proceedings.

* Park ranger or wildlife guide: Check with the National Park Service.

* Reunion organizer: With all the family and class reunions, someone needs to organize these events. There's even a National Association of Reunion Managers, www.reunions.com.

* Virtual assistants: They're the folks who provide support and service via the phone, Internet and fax machine from a distance. For more information, contact the International Virtual Assistant Association at www.ivaa.org.

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